The Sun Kunoichi
by Memorium Activity
Summary: A quiet daughter. A clan's only son. And a boy whose best friends are insects. Squad Eight was a risk, but sometimes risks pay off. Slightly AU. NaruHina, ShinoIno and KibaOC as story progresses. Updated! Chapter 10 - A Successful Match. Warning: Some blood, adult themes, sadness and such.
1. First Day

Hey. I'm Memorium Activity (got it from a Captcha thing), and some day I'll be the greatest novelist in the world!...lol, just stating my goals the way Naruto would. I'm gonna write a variety of genres – science fiction, fantasy, historical fiction, etc – but here I'm putting up my first fanfic in…certainly a while, at least. It's been three years since I gave up fanfiction because of time constraints and personal issues, but I'm back now – older, wiser, and probably a bunch taller than I was when I used to write fanfic. (I'd like to say I got taught better writing techniques by a pervy old hermit, but that's not quite the case :). )

This is my first Naruto fanfic; I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it so far. It could be quite long, or it might trail off in the middle, but hopefully I'll stick with it and see where it goes. It's slightly AU at the moment but not to a great extent. Things'll branch off from canon more at a specific point in the Chunin Exams, but for now, it's mostly canon from a different perspective.

* * *

_Chapter One:_ _First Day_

Hinata Hyuga was always early for school.

A time there had once been when the shy, violet-eyed girl had bound through Konoha's streets with great speed to reach the Academy on time, but such days were past. When Hinata had first started school, her minders had somewhat carelessly permitted her to simply walk from the Hyuga compound to the Academy, expecting that she would either find it eventually or just go back to them if she couldn't.

These minders had sorely underestimated exactly how shy Hinata Hyuga was, even at that young age. They were fired shortly after Hiashi Hyuga had found out about their incompetence, but that was precious little comfort to Hinata on the morning of the first day itself. Clutching her bag, the girl looked out onto the vast sea of faces before her and expressed her feelings quietly: not with a curse, but a whimper.

Taking her first steps forward, Hinata then immediately leapt out of the way of a messenger-ninja and breathed in deeply, carefully ducking past people in an attempt to move up the road. It was a bad idea to begin with; although Hinata had no idea at the time, this was one of Konoha's main roads. It was slow work moving forward, and the noise and the crowds made the girl shrink even further into herself.

"E-excuse me," she said quietly as she passed a man carrying a few dogs, then had to stop again to let a ninja dressed in robes pass. "Uh, does a-anyone..."

_It's no use_, Hinata thought. _Nobody seems to notice me. Although I suppose I am shorter than most of them, so I guess it's because they don't look down for me._

It was no use. It'd been at least five minutes, and she'd only gone a few metres up from where she first got onto the road. Stuck in a small niche in front of a closed door, Hinata worriedly looked out from left to right, wondering how she'd get out.

_They said it would only take ten minutes to get there_! Hinata worried. _Hiashi-sama will be angry if I don't get to school on time for the first day._

Hinata thought worriedly of her father's stern gaze whenever she failed, and resolved to get to school on time, even if she had to run faster than she ever had before.

_Of course_, she thought, _a place this crowded isn't very good for running_.

Suddenly, an opening in the crowd behind her brought Hinata, lost in thought, crashing from her worries and down onto the ground, knocked over by a tall woman with short hair.

_Uh?_ thought Hinata.

She stood up and looked at the woman more closely. She was in her late teens with light brown eyes and dark hair worn shorter than Hinata's, done up in what looked to be a ponytail. She was wearing a very short jacket; not only that, but she was wearing a top short enough for her bellybutton to show! Hinata marvelled at anybody being allowed to wear clothes as this woman did. Looking up further, Hinata also noticed that the woman was wearing a forehead protector.

_A kunoichi!_ Hinata mentally gasped. _I mustn't offend her, she might tell the people at the school and then they'll think I'm hopeless!_

The ninja spoke.

"Ya okay there, kid?" she asked, smiling further and closing her eyes. "I kinda ran into you there."

"S-sorry, sensei!" Hinata bowed slightly. "I shouldn't have been standing around like that. I'm wasting your time."

"Huh?" The ninja looked confused. "Uh, you're not wasting my time. Besides, I'm the one who ran into you. Sorry." She scratched the back of her head and smiled further.

Hinata looked down at her feet, and nodded.

"Yes, sensei."

"I'm not a sensei," said the ninja. "I'm Anko. Anko Mitarashi. What's your name?"

"H-Hinata...Hyuga."

"Mm!" nodded Anko. "Hyuga. That explains the eyes. You should look up more, I think they're cool!"

Hinata tried to look up at Anko, but years of training overtook Anko's suggestion and the girl looked back down again.

"So what's a Hyuga kid doing out here with us mortals?" asked Anko.

"I...I...school."

"Oh!" said Anko, and her eyes widened. "Uh, you're kind of going the wrong way, then. The Academy's over there."

She pointed behind her and nodded.

_!_ thought Hinata, hanging her head. _I can't find anywhere! I'll never be any good at being a ninja._

"Please don't tell the school," said Hinata. "If they find out I'm late they...might..."

"Might what?" asked Anko in confusion.

"F-fail me?"

Anko laughed.

_This kid has a lot to learn. Who knew Hyuga were so sheltered?_

Anko stopped laughing when she realised that the little girl was quietly sobbing. She crouched down and looked into Hinata's eyes.

"I didn't mean it like that, c'mon," she said. "Nobody's gonna fail you just for being late, kid. Some people are late all the time, even chunin and jonin!"

Anko's smiling proved infectious. For the first time that day, Hinata stopped worrying, if only briefly.

"Come on," said Anko. "I'll get you through this crowd of maggots!"

_Eww_! Hinata privately thought, but she quietly nodded and accepted Anko's hand anyway.

Hand in hand, the two stepped back into the crowd. This time it was not a struggle for right of way – people moved for Anko in a way that amazed Hinata – it was more a struggle to keep hold on Anko's hand. As they walked, Hinata felt Anko's hand and her eyes widened. It was scarred and calloused, far from the smooth hands of her minders. How could anyone's hands be so rough? Even though her knowledge of a ninja's work was much, much higher than the average six year old's, adults had always remained tight-lipped around her about what exactly a ninja mission entailed.

_Anko must be a very powerful kunoichi_, thought Hinata. _And she's so much older! She must be eighteen at least!_

Finally passing a man pushing cabbages in a wheelbarrow, Anko and Hinata reached the edge of the main road, some way away from Hinata's starting point. This was good. She'd moved ahead.

"Well, we're here now," said Anko, stepping off the main road and onto another street.

"But we haven't reached the school yet," said Hinata.

"You can get there!" said Anko. "It's easy. Just follow this street 'til it ends, then turn left."

Hinata looked down the street. It was quite a long stretch, but much thinner and less bustling than the main road. In fact, there was nobody there at all.

The violet-eyed girl fretted. "But what if I need your-"

Anko was gone.

"...help?"

Hinata sighed. It made sense that Anko would have other things to do, but she still would've liked to have stayed with her a bit longer. She was like a big sister, almost.

_I hope I can be the same for Hanabi_, she thought, thinking of her baby sister. _Well, except I'll keep my bellybutton covered._

Hinata's navel gazing was interrupted once again by a distant, repetitive noise increasing in sound. She stopped to focus on it as it grew louder and louder, until she was sure the source was very, very close.

It sounded like "Wheeeee!"

Turning around, Hinata Hyuga found the source of the noise. Perhaps three feet above her and flying through the air was a blue-eyed boy about her age, hair the colour of the sun, wearing a white t-shirt with a red spiral on it, leaping through the air and grinning wildly.

_Wow_, thought Hinata.

The source of the noise landed with utmost confidence and poise a foot in front of Hinata, then lost balance and fell forward to the ground, pushing her down with him.

Lying on the ground for the second time that day, Hinata focused on the boy, although it would have been hard not to as his face was only a few inches from hers, smiling away as he pushed himself up with his hands slightly.

"Hi!" said the boy, not moving. "Sorry, I like jumping around and I didn't see you 'til it was too late. You're not hurt, are you?"

_He's...beautiful!_

"You're nice!" he said. "Most girls punch me if I land on them. But I guess you want me to get off now, right?"

Hinata trembled, and she quickly said "No!"

"Huh?" the boy said.

Hinata suddenly felt her cheeks go bright red.

_That's...strange,_ thought Hinata. _Is there something wrong with my face? I can't be sick, the compound is very careful about that sort of thing!_

"N-no, I'm not hurt."

Fortunately, she had landed on her backpack, so she hadn't hit her head, but even if she had, it didn't really matter to her. The only question on her mind was: who was this boy, and what was happening to her face?

To her regret, the boy pushed himself further up and stood up in front of her. He held out a hand and she took it, pulling herself up and almost into his arms.

"Uh, so you're okay now?" asked the boy.

Hinata nodded, then suddenly remembered why she was here and shook her head.

"School! I have to get to school on time!"

The boy shuffled his feet.

"Uh, sorry, but I'm pretty sure you can't do that now. School'd been on for five minutes when I left."

"When you left?" asked Hinata. "Where do you live?"

"About twenty minutes' walk, five minutes' hop," said the boy, grinning.

Hinata brushed herself off, and resolved to learn more about how to get around faster in the future – jumping as high as this boy could would definitely mean no more crowd-trouble. But right now, there was no time.

"Ten minutes late! If Hiashi-sama discovers I'm late for school, I don't know what punishment he'll give me!"

The boy (who had been determinedly counting on his fingers to confirm to himself that five plus five was indeed ten) suddenly forgot his arithmetic and looked concerned, angry and resolved, all at once.

"Who's Hiashi? If he's hurting you, take me to him and I'll fight him for you!"

Hinata shook her head rapidly and grabbed the boy's arm (partly for fear, partly for other, rapidly developing reasons).

"No, you mustn't! He's a very powerful ninja!"

The boy grinned.

"So am I!"

"W-what?! You're not even older than me!"

The blond, far from angered at this statement, simply pointed to the heavens and said, half for Hinata's benefit and half for his own:

"I'll get stronger! Some day I'll be a great ninja! I'll be the Hokage!"

Hinata privately wondered what exactly he was pointing at, but his determination was still very impressive.

She rubbed the side of her neck in shyness.

"Um...I don't want to be rude, but...who are you?"

Now it was his turn to be perplexed.

_She doesn't know who I am? I thought everybody knew!_

"Uh, I'm Naruto. Naruto Uzumaki?"

Naruto winced in expectation of the standard response – repulsion, widened eyes, and even spitting were not uncommon – but was surprised to see the girl before him smile, bow slightly and say:

"I am Hinata of the Clan Hyuga. I am pleased to meet you, Naruto Uzumaki."

Naruto laughed, and scratched the back of his head.

"Well, we'd better go quickly. Can't miss any more school!"

With this, Naruto began to stride forward, and Hinata quickly fell in behind him, feeling much happier than she had been.

_He's so...determined! I've never seen anyone so open about how strong they are. He'll be the best ninja in the class!_

Smiling, Hinata Hyuga walked to her first day of school.

* * *

Iruka Umino stared up at the group of children in front of him and suppressed an urge to sigh. Parents were always going on about how perfect, cute and polite their children were, but this unruly group was going to be difficult. It was only his second year of dealing with such a class, and he'd have them all for the full six years. He suddenly realized why Asuma had taken up smoking – stress relief – and briefly considered it himself, before realizing that he coughed excessively if he so much as sat near a heater.

There were the usual assortment of ninja from the clans, of course. An Inuzuka, wrapped in a fur coat, strange eyes looking around in excitement and grinning from ear to ear. Iruka didn't expect too much of that kid at first – Inuzukas didn't usually get their dog partners until they were about ten, as he recalled – but he wondered if the boy was planning on wearing fur all year round. Konoha got _warm_ in the summer months.

Then there was an Aburame, seated a few rows behind the Inuzuka and stoic as ever. Iruka didn't know the Aburame clan's special technique, but he had heard vague rumours that it had something to do with mind-controlling bugs. Resolving to find out eventually, Iruka moved on.

Ah! Two thirds of the classic team were already friends! A Nara and an Akimichi were in the row second from the back, one sitting slouched and the other eating chips. Both were talking about something or other, a game of sorts that they seemed to play, although the Nara didn't look like the type to play sports. Iruka then focused on the third part of the Ino-Shika-Cho team – a blonde Yamanaka girl who was apparently trying to convince everyone she was much older than she actually was.

His eyes then flitted around the room randomly. A pink-haired girl. A ponytailed boy. A boy with dark, straight hair.

_Hmm, looks quite like his brother._

The door opened to reveal two more students. One was a short girl, a Hyuga, blinking shyly through the dark hair that fell in front of her face and clutching her books nervously. The other Iruka knew only too well, because he was virtually Iruka's little brother – Naruto Uzumaki.

"Hey, Iruka," waved Naruto. "We're not too late, are we?"

Iruka put the roll down. They weren't late; the class had been so long in getting organised and in their seats that nothing had been accomplished yet anyway. However, he still needed to lay the law down, now.

"Naruto, if you're planning on coming to school every day, you'll need to get here the same time as everybody else. And you'll address me as Iruka-sensei in school time."

Naruto nodded.

"Ok, Iruka."

There was a pause, and Iruka coughed.

"...-sensei."

The class snickered. Iruka nodded to Naruto, and turned his attention to the girl.

"That goes for you too, miss..."

"H-Hyuga," the girl stuttered.

The Nara boy rolled his eyes.

"Uh, pretty sure we guessed that," he said. "Not many other people have weird eyes like the Hyuga."

The Inuzuka stood up in anger, fist clenched.

"You got a problem with people with weird eyes, punk?!" he shouted.

Iruka leaned forward.

"Enough of that! You're here to learn! Sit down..."

Iruka flipped through the roll and found the Inuzuka's name.

"...Kiba."

Kiba scowled at this, but complied, and the Nara boy slouched further, muttering "what a drag".

Iruka turned back to the two newcomers. "Anyway, Naruto, you should get up earlier if you want to make it without running."

"I didn't run! I jumped here! Believe it! I left home at 8:20 and I got here at 8:30!"

Iruka frowned.

"When'd you get up?"

"8:19!"

"That's not even possible," said the Nara boy. "If you got up a minute before you left, you wouldn't have time to eat breakfast or brush your teeth or change your clothes or anything."

"Nope!" said Naruto.

"Eww!" said the class in general.

One pink-haired girl tauntingly said:

"If you just left immediately, why aren't you in pyjamas?"

The students all laughed at this, but Naruto's resolve was only strengthened.

"When you're a great ninja, there's no time for pyjamas! And I'll be the greatest ninja of them all! Believe it!"

"We believe it," said Iruka. "Now you and..."

"Her name's Hinata!" said Naruto.

Iruka tried very hard not to throw chalk at him, and barely succeeded.

"...Hinata can sit down in the front row. And..."

_What's the Nara boy's name?_ Iruka hazarded a guess.

"...Shikaku?"

"Shikamaru," said the boy.

"Shikamaru, you're not to say anything unless you've got your hand up."

Shikamaru considered this for a moment, held his right hand up, then continued talking to the Akimichi beside him.

Iruka resigned himself to a very long day.

* * *

Kiba Inuzuka sat on a chair outside the head office of the Ninja Academy and tried to not appear too happy at his state of affairs. He had several bruises, his foot hurt, he was bleeding in two places and there was mud on his coat. His mother would kill him.

She'd paid a _lot_ of money for that coat.

Wiping the mud from his face and pulling the hood up further, Kiba sat back and imagined what his punishment would be. He was, admittedly, a little scared, but whatever it was, it was nothing compared to the glory that such a schoolyard battle would bring to him; people would _definitely_ remember him now.

He felt no ill will towards his opponent, of course. Despite a general consensus between adults and agreed to by their children that Naruto was a weirdo and annoying, Kiba resolved that if he did beat Naruto up (and that was not unlikely, considering how easy it was to provoke him), it was for his own good. It would make him tougher, or at least teach him to pick his battles better. Or at all.

A door nearby opened, and the student in question was frogmarched forward and plonked onto the chair next to Kiba, then left to his own devices. He had an equality of blood and mud all over him, but unlike Kiba his blood was mostly from scars that had already healed. Kiba had noticed directly after the fight that one of Naruto's wounds, a scratch on his arm, was already healing, even as Iruka-sensei was lifting him up to take him inside quickly.

For a moment, the two boys simply stared forward, both breathing calmly.

"...worth it?" asked Naruto, slightly numb from the tooth that the medical ninja had just regrown for him.

Kiba thought about this.

"...worth it."

Their mutual appreciation for the fight was broken by the sound of Iruka's door opening. Nodding to each other, they both walked into Iruka's office and sat down.

Iruka remained silent, the clock ticking with every second.

"So," began Iruka, "You both decided it would be a good idea to start brawling in the middle of the playground."

More silence followed, until Naruto spoke.

"We were..." Naruto looked around for inspiration, saw a book in Iruka's bookcase, and said:

"Practicing taijutsu! Yep! That's what we were doing!"

Iruka raised an eyebrow.

"Taijutsu is an art in which a ninja uses carefully calculated strikes against an enemy using their arms and legs. What _you_ did, Naruto, was more of a no-holds-barred brawl using every body part available against a fellow student."

"Hmm," said Naruto, "Kiba wasn't my enemy, though. Kiba was just my opponent. _Shikamaru_ was my enemy."

"Shikamaru Nara?" asked Iruka. "Why? What'd he do?"

"Well," said Naruto, "I was going to sit near that tree with the swing, except Ino and her friend were already sitting there and they wouldn't move, so I left when Shikamaru called me a sissy for lettin' a girl tell me what to do, so I said I'd fight him. Besides, you heard how he talked to Hinata when we first got into the classroom, Iruka-sensei! He's just a jerk, plain and simple."

"Mm-hmm," said Iruka. "So you were planning on fighting Shikamaru for a lady's honour."

"Uhhh..." Naruto thought. He hadn't really thought of Hinata as a girl until this point, but he supposed it was true; she _was_ a lady and he was _technically_ fighting for her honour.

"Sure! Yeah, that's what happened! Believe it!"

"And then what happened?" asked Iruka.

"Well," Naruto continued, "_then_ Shikamaru said that he couldn't fight me so Choji would have to fight me for him, but Choji's too fat, so we were gonna get Shino to do it but he wasn't around, so the only other guy around was Kiba."

Iruka turned to Kiba, scratching caked-on mud off his coat.

"Kiba, is this true?"

"Yeah," said Kiba nonchalantly.

"And you fought him?" asked Iruka.

Kiba nodded.

Iruka said: "Didn't Shikamaru insult you earlier today?"

Kiba thought on this.

"Well, yeah," he said, "But we had a bet on this fight, Iruka-sensei. Whoever won it got to kiss Sakura Haruno."

Iruka remained stern, although he thought internally: _That was quick. It took a few months before boys starting fighting over any girl with last year's group._

"Did Sakura know about this?"

"Uh, no," said Kiba. "We had the fight after school, so I think she went home before it started."

"I don't know about you," he said, addressing Naruto, "but I was planning to kiss her tomorrow if I won."

"Yeah," said Naruto, conferring, "That makes sense. I'd do that."

Iruka leaned forward.

"Well, first of all, you can't treat girls as trophies you win. That's not what they're for."

Naruto frowned.

"Then what are they for?" he asked.

"Yeah," said Kiba, interested. "What are girls for?"

_Oh god,_ thought Iruka. _They are too young for this. Maybe I'm too young for this!_

"I'll tell you later," he said vaguely. "Next year sometime. But right now, both of you aren't to fight each other, or anyone else, again. Am I clear?"

The boys both nodded.

"It's Sasuke's fault anyway," said Naruto.

"Sasuke Uchiha? Why?" asked Iruka.

"'Cos all the girls are soooo obsessed with him!" said Naruto.

He flapped his arms. "Ooh! Look at me! I'm Sasuke! My hair flips around and my clan is powerful! Big deal! I don't see _him_ fighting anyone for a lady's honour, right Iruka?...sensei?"

"Nevertheless," said Iruka, "No more fighting from either of you. If you're so keen to learn taijutsu, we start classes on it in a few weeks. You can train there. Now, are you both okay to walk? Naruto, has your tooth healed?"

"Mm-hmm," nodded the boy.

"Alright, you can both go."

As they trudged out of the office, Naruto declared:

"I say the only decent girl _anywhere_ is Hinata. And maybe Ayame."

"Who's Ayame?" asked Kiba.

"She works at the Ichiraku Ramen Bar!" said Naruto.

The two reached the end of the corridor.

"Well," said Naruto, "See you tomorrow."

"Yeah, bye," said Kiba.

Naruto returned.

"Hey, who won?" he asked. "I was kinda too out of it to ask Shikamaru."

Kiba sighed.

"I think he said we were both losers, and the whole thing was just 'troublesome'."

* * *

The first two chapters'll be set when the Rookie 9 are about 6 years old, but we'll timeskip to the start of the series proper in Chapter Three.

Please review!


	2. Defeat Means Friendship

Hello, hello, guten tag, hello, hola, tere, labas, dia dhuit, selamat datang. (Those greetings are to all the people who read Chapter One.) Hey again, you guys! I'd like to thank everybody who read the first chapter. (See though, the weird thing is, five Australians read the first chapter, but I got thirteen hits from Australia, so either everybody read the chapter at least twice or there's one Aussie that really liked it.) It might seem like it was unimportant now, but everyone who featured promenantly in the first chapter will become important later on, so I hope you all paid attention!

Also, little ad right now: go see _How To Train Your Dragon_ now if you haven't already. It's an excellent, excellent movie.

* * *

_Chapter Two: Defeat Means Friendship_

Hinata was rarely sure about anything, but today was different. Today, after weeks and weeks of hearing him, seeing him, being in the same class as him and spending most of the day with him, she was absolutely sure.

Shikamaru Nara _hated_ her.

It'd been the second day of school when she first noticed. She'd left home earlier than she had the first day – _much_ earlier – and had carefully walked to the Academy, yawning as she went and wishing she'd brought food. The Hyuga clan usually all ate very formally. From seven to eight in the morning, every main house Hyuga member sat in the same, large room and ate breakfast together. This was a chance for members to communicate, organise and socially bond, although as the daughter of Lord Hiashi Hinata had a limited ability to participate. Such breakfasts had been tradition for generations, and leaving early from a meal was unthinkable. Hinata didn't have time to spend a full hour eating carefully and trying not to rouse the attention of the other Hyuga, so she skipped breakfast completely.

Walking carefully through the streets, she finally stopped at the front gate to discover that it was only 7:45 AM – half an hour until school started! She sat down quietly by the gate and tried to ignore the rumbling in her stomach by watching the scene in front of her.

It was nice, actually. The morning mists were collecting on the grass as dew, the sun was vaguely peeking out from the horizon, and there were stirrings of human life as people left their houses for work, some leaping off into the unknown to reach their workplaces.

_I wish I could jump around like they can_, she thought. _Perhaps Naruto can teach me. Yes, I'd like that! I'll ask him later today._

As she thought this, she saw someone walk around the corner. It was another student...that boy who'd talked all through class on the first day. Shikamaru, his name was.

As he rounded the corner, he saw Hinata. Trying to appear inviting to him – it was only _his_ second day too – Hinata smiled and nodded at him, hoping her hunger didn't make her look angry or strange. He stared at her from a few metres away, then visibly rolled his eyes and turned around, avoiding her completely. He walked over to the far side of the gate and leaned on the wall, looking out at nothing in particular.

Hinata looked down sadly.

_Why would he do that? Have I done something wrong? Maybe he didn't notice me. Maybe I should go and speak with him? But, I don't want to annoy him! What did I do?_

Hunching over in the corner, Hinata realised that not only was she hungry, she was cold as well.

A few minutes passed before the next person to arrive appeared. He was dark-haired, wearing a fur hoodie, and had unusual eyes. Two red markings were on his cheeks, and he was short, although still bigger than Naruto.

_Him! He's the one that yelled at Shikamaru in class_, she thought. _Maybe he'll sit with me!_

"Uh, uhm..." Hinata ventured. She was very quiet, but the boy heard her.

Kiba Inuzuka looked to his right. Huddled in the corner was the small, quiet girl that had come in with Naruto yesterday, and off in the distance was Shikamaru, leaning against a wall and frowning. Putting two and two together, Kiba took a step towards Shikamaru and yelled:

"Hey! You gonna sit with us?!"

Shikamaru looked up and gave Kiba the same disdainful look that he'd given to Hinata.

"_No_," he replied, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

The sound of his answer, quiet as it was, reverberated across the courtyard, and Hinata shivered slightly. Shikamaru could fit a _lot_ of contempt in a single word. Kiba, on the other hand, merely gave a brief gesture or possibly hand seal with his right hand in Shikamaru's direction, and sat down next to Hinata.

"You should wear a jacket," he said. "You look really cold."

There was a silence, then Kiba muttered something and took his jacket off. He draped it over Hinata like a cloak (it was several sizes to big for her to wear); she took it gratefully, feeling the fluffy parts on her arms. It smelled slightly of dogs, but she didn't mind all that much.

"Doesn't your mom tell you to keep warm all the time?" he asked, leaning back again.

Hinata mumbled something.

"Huh?" asked Kiba.

"S-she's dead," said Hinata quietly.

"Oh," said Kiba. "Well, uh, don't listen to Shikamaru over there. He's just a jerk."

Kiba gave the boy another look, then continued.

"I mean, sure you're a girl, but that doesn't mean it's okay to just leave you there alone and jacket-less. That's _wrong_. My dad always says, you gotta treat girls right."

He frowned, then added:

"Not sure why, though. Whenever he says it my mom laughs and pushes him over."

Hinata looked at him in confusion.

_Did Shikamaru avoid me because I'm a girl? No, that doesn't seem right..._

"Sooo..." remarked Kiba. "You're friends with Naruto?"

_I hope I am,_ Hinata thought. _He said most girls punch him if he tries to get close...but how could they? How could anyone hate him? He's so nice!_

Too shy to say what she really thought, she instead mumbled something, which Kiba correctly took as confirmation.

She was very strange to Kiba. When he was younger, he'd always assumed that girls weren't all that different to boys. After all, his mom and sister did pretty much the exact same things as his dad. This worldview had generally served him well in the past (although his sister Hana had been rather peeved when he'd asked her why she couldn't grow a beard once), but it had been broken almost immediately when he'd first gone into the village proper. Seeing girls play clapping games and loudly squealing with each other was so weird that he'd had to ask his mom for confirmation that they were, indeed, girls.

He'd expected better of the girls that would be at the Academy, but again they disappointed him. Not _one_ of them was interested in fighting, almost all of them were afraid of getting mud on their jackets, and they were just so _weird_!

All of them except for Sakura Haruno. She was still frightened of getting mud on herself and was still uninterested in fighting, true, but Kiba could definitely see why. Her hair was bright pink in a way that you could see from across the playground, and she smelt like nothing else. He'd fought Naruto Uzumaki on Shikamaru's behalf mostly for the fun of it, but he couldn't deny that Sakura Haruno was definitely a good target.

That was, of course, until she inevitably opened her mouth. Her voice was so grating! And her forehead was enormous! Driven by such contradictory thoughts, Kiba thought on Naruto's declaration yesterday: that Hinata was the only decent girl anywhere. He wasn't quite so prejudiced, but he agreed that Hinata was certainly nicer than most.

"That guy is weird," he declared.

"No he's not!" she protested. "He helped me get to school yesterday when I was lost. And he said he'd fight Shikamaru for me as well."

She looked over at Shikamaru, but couldn't tell if he had any bruises.

_That's not good_, she thought. _If he has no bruises, then Naruto can't have won...but no, he must have! He's so determined!_

"I said weird," said Kiba, "Not 'bad'. And, uh, he didn't fight Shikamaru for you. He fought me. Like, I fought for Shikamaru, against Naruto."

"You?" asked Hinata. "Why you? I thought you didn't like Shikamaru."

"A fight's a fight," shrugged Kiba.

"Boys are weird," thought Hinata aloud.

"Hey, I'm not weird!" said Kiba angrily. "Naruto's the weird one. He challenged _every_ other boy to a fight yesterday. He's lucky I'm the only one said 'yes'."

A silence followed.

"Wait," said Kiba, "What's your name again?"

"H-hinata...of the clan Hyuga."

"Cool," he said. "I'm from a clan too! I'm Kiba Inuzuka."

Their conversation was interrupted by the sudden appearance of another boy coming around the corner and into sight. He was quite tall and thin for his age, wearing a white jacket and dark, rounded sunglasses. His voice was like a stage whisper as he addressed Kiba by saying:

"You have a very small clan."

Kiba glared and clenched a fist.

"No I don't! The Inuzuka clan is fine! It's big! Who asked you anyway?!"

"H-how many people are in your clan?" asked Hinata, curious.

"Um..." said Kiba. "Uh..."

The other boy said nothing, but stared on expectantly. Kiba hung his head and admitted it.

"Four. Including me."

Hinata considered this.

"Does that count as a clan?" she asked, quizzically.

"I _gave_ you my _jacket_!" said Kiba angrily. "And you don't even think I have a clan!"

"I'm sorry!" she said reflexively. "I'm sure your clan is very powerful."

"It consists of three active ninja," said the glassed boy, "and one student."

"Yeah…well...my dad says you eat bugs," Kiba bit back.

The glassed boy considered this.

"No," he replied. "We like them, but we don't eat them."

"W-who-" began Hinata, which Kiba interrupted.

"He's an Aburame," he explained.

Hinata did not quite understand this, but didn't want to seem stupid in front of her new friend(s?), so she said nothing.

The Aburame (whatever that was) spoke again.

"Have you considered going around the other way? If you do, there's a room for the teachers. It's much warmer than out here - I don't even need my jacket."

He looked at Kiba, then Hinata, then the borrowed jacket she was wearing.

"Wearing a jacket will keep you warmer," he informed her.

"That's what I said," shrugged Kiba, with an air of '_girls_, huh?' to his voice.

The crouching boy and girl nodded to one another in agreement. Picking his bag up, Kiba stood up to follow the glassed boy; Hinata did the same, wrapping Kiba's jacket around her. They left the courtyard behind, following the glassed boy to a door around the corner that Hinata hadn't noticed the first time she'd passed it. Leaning forward, the glassed boy knocked three times, and it opened to reveal Iruka.

"Oh, hello!" said Iruka, thankfully after his morning coffee. "Kiba. Hinata. ..."

Awkwardness permeated the four.

"I am Shino," said the glassed boy.

"Shino, sorry," their teacher apologised. "You guys got here pretty early. If this happens often, I'll let you wait in here while it's so cold out. Did anyone else come with you?"

"No," Kiba said.

"Okay, well-"

"Yes," said Hinata and Shino in unison.

Iruka turned to Kiba.

"Kiba," said Iruka, "Why would you make one of your friends stay out in the cold on a day like this?"

"'Cos he's not my friend," said Kiba. "He's just an asshole."

Iruka rubbed his head.

"Kiba, don't say that word."

"'Friend?'" asked Kiba.

"No, the other one."

"'Just'?" he grinned.

Iruka frowned.

_Smartass._

"Kiba, go and get him."

The Inuzuka angrily complied, stomping back to the courtyard.

"Who is it out there?" asked Iruka.

"Shikamaru Nara," responded Shino.

_Ugh,_ thought Iruka. _Now I know why Kiba wanted him to stay out...no, Iruka, you're meant to be nice! Just try to keep him quiet..._

Kiba and Shikamaru returned, the taller boy greeting Iruka casually. Iruka suppressed frowning and greeted him in return.

"Come on," he said, "Let's get inside. School starts in a few minutes anyway."

Kiba and Shino followed immediately, stepping into the warmth of the room and visibly relaxing, leaving Shikamaru and Hinata by themselves.

Here, Shikamaru put his hands in his pockets and walked forward, but as he did, he turned a little. Staring back at Hinata, his eyes went to her face, then down to her borrowed jacket, then up to her face again, staring on with the same vague sneer he had for everything else. Then, for the briefest of moments, his mouth twisted upward to make a smirk.

This was far worse than the single syllable '_No_' that he had said before. He could utterly destroy somebody without saying anything. That was the moment where Hinata began to realise how much Shikamaru Nara hated her.

It had been a few weeks since that day, and Hinata had slowly adjusted to her new routine. She would go to school in the morning and spend most of the day frantically taking notes on what Iruka-sensei said and trying to pluck up the courage to tell Naruto that trying to physically battle everyone else in the world was a bad idea. On Fridays after school she'd take the long way home, where Anko Mitarashi would meet her and they'd go eat cinnamon rolls together. Hinata liked Anko. She was more rough around the edges than any of the women in the Hyuga clan, almost like a boy herself, but she was also a lot warmer and friendlier than any other girl Hinata knew. Slowly, Hinata began to call her 'Anko-neesan' ('big sister Anko'), which both surprised and delighted the jonin.

Hinata still hadn't gotten around to buying a jacket, but the weather had been unseasonably warm so it hadn't mattered that much. Classes had progressed a long way farther than she had ever hoped; they were all the way up to their seven times tables now!

Of course, the older students were mostly contemptuous of the younger ones' knowledge. A week ago an Uchiha boy in third year had made fun of Hinata for thinking nine times eight was 75, but Naruto had valiantly defended Hinata by stepping in and insisting on fighting the Uchiha boy. The ensuing brawl meant that Naruto lost yet another tooth and first year students were banned from playing with older students, an offence that didn't do wonders for Naruto's popularity, but Hinata was thankful anyway.

Thinking about it as the students worked on math problems, Hinata wondered why exactly everybody in the school seemed to hate Naruto so much. The banning of contact with older children wasn't exactly much of a fuss to anyone other than Ino Yamanaka, whose obsession with being mature was almost as strong as Shino's fascination with bugs, but even so, all the other class members regularly informed Naruto that he was a loser and an idiot who would never amount to anything. Naruto always defiantly tried even harder at his studies in response to this, but he mysteriously never seemed to improve. Hinata admired his endless reserves of resolve, and wished she was as certain of her abilities as he was of his.

Suddenly, the bell rang for lunch, and many of the students started to pack away their pencils and paper. Iruka stood up from his desk and addressed the class.

"Okay, remember everyone, you've got taijutsu class after lunch, so be back five minutes early!"

Hinata groaned. Taijutsu class was one of the things about school that she definitely did not like. It was hard enough learning all the complicated ways to punch, kick or block, let alone applying them in a fight with another person.

Sighing again, Hinata went to finish the last few problems, then packed up. As she put her pencils away, she noticed that Naruto himself was still sitting up in the back row of the classroom, staring out the window. This was very strange. Usually Naruto would have been out of the door as soon as the bell went. He had nearly boundless amounts of energy, and it took a lot of running around to burn all of it off.

Picking up her pencilcase and paper, she left her seat and walked up to the row. After a few moments of nothing happening, she cleared her throat slightly and Naruto looked back at her.

_Oh!_ He thought. _It's Hinata! She's so quiet sometimes it's scary. That girl could sneak up on anyone!_

"Hey Hinata," he said, waving. "How're you?"

"Uh, um, fine," said Hinata. "A-are you alright, Naruto?"

Naruto looked down at his work.

"Uh," he said, "Yeah. I guess."

Hinata shuffled her feet slightly.

_What's she talkin' to me for?_ thought Naruto. _Isn't she gonna go hang out with...with...hey, come to think of it, Hinata seems to be alone most of the time I see her. I should eat lunch with her! That way, I can ask her about my problem!_

"Hey," he said, "How about we eat lunch together?"

Hinata's eyes widened with joy.

"Yes!" she said quickly. "And...after that, will you teach me how to jump as high as you?"

Naruto was surprised by this.

"Uh...okay!"

Gathering his things and following Hinata out, Naruto lead Hinata to a shady corner in the courtyard and sat down. Opening their lunchboxes, the children ate their onigiri; Naruto expositing between mouthfuls about how he would beat everyone else in taijutsu class, Hinata listening attentively. He was so certain of how he'd beat Sasuke Uchiha, Choji Akimichi and, Hinata smiled happily, Shikamaru Nara. She then felt bad about this.

_I shouldn't think that about Shikamaru,_ she thought. _I don't know why he's so mean to me all the time, but I hope I can find out – and then whatever I did, I can fix._

"...kick him in the chest," concluded Naruto. "I mean, Shikamaru's so lazy he'll barely bother to fight back. He'll never get anywhere without working harder!"

Speak of the devil, Shikamaru stepped out from behind a tree and drawlingly spoke.

"At least I know how to count," he said, "And spell. And I don't spend half my life in the hospital wing. You've lost how many teeth now?"

"Six," replied Naruto angrily. "And you're not supposed to listen to other people's conversations, you know!"

Shikamaru rolled his eyes.

"Not much of a conversation," he said. "_You_ talk, and Hinata sits there shivering like it's the Land of Snow. You'll never get anywhere because you're an idiot, and Hinata..."

Hinata gulped and looked away from Shikamaru.

"What about Hinata, huh?!" shouted Naruto. "What's your problem?"

"She's weak," said Shikamaru. "She only sits with you because she thinks she's better than everybody else, and she knows _you'll_ fight anyone that says otherwise."

He walked away, hands in his pockets.

Naruto stared forward at Shikamaru in disgust. Although he was young, he had long since learned that most of the villagers didn't like him. Many of the other children in the village wouldn't play with him at all, jeering at him whenever he approached. Before school had started he had pretty much wandered the entire village daily, searching in vain for other children on the street who wouldn't curse him or simply run off whenever he appeared. (None of this did wonders for his self esteem, but it did give him a nearly unparallelled knowledge of the town's layout.) He'd hoped that things would be different once he started school, but even the students who didn't know him already still all seemed to reject him immediately, telling him he was a freak and an idiot. It wasn't fair! Just because he was still stuck on three-times tables…Kiba Inuzuka couldn't do them that well either!

Actually, Kiba wasn't so bad. Rough, somewhat crude and not particularly interested in reading, Naruto would have befriended Kiba immediately if not for his predicament. Remembering disastrous attempts at making friends with Ino, Sasuke, Choji, and in desperation even Shikamaru, Naruto kept his distance from Kiba until he had a stroke of luck – the fight over Sakura on the first day. He'd really been thankful when Kiba volunteered to fight him on Shikamaru's behalf; it saved him from having to approach Kiba in the normal way. Despite the pain that resulted from their first bout, Naruto eagerly challenged Kiba to a fight the next day, and to his surprise the other boy accepted. They weren't quite friends yet, but it was nice to have someone's undivided attention, even if it was for the purpose of beating you up.

The situation worked so well for Naruto that he tried it with almost everybody else. It failed with girls, of course, as for the most part they were uninterested in fighting, but unfortunately neither were most of the other boys. Shino spent most of his time alone and staring at anthills, Sasuke studied instead of playing, Choji was more interested in food and Shikamaru was so abrasive Naruto wasn't really interested in being his friend anyway. The only other person Naruto hadn't challenged to a fight was Hinata. He got the feeling that he'd have to go easy on her; she was so timid!

Kiba was not Naruto's favourite target because he was an easy opponent, however. He had a very powerful kick and was much bigger than Naruto, factors that all but won him every fight. In spite of this, Naruto still fought him almost every day, and as he fought more and more, he became more and more aware of _how_ Kiba fought, and how to counter it. A punch that hit him one day would be dodged the next; a kick that knocked him to the ground would miss him completely the second time. It was this way he learned how to fight; copying what worked and throwing out what didn't.

The idea was nothing new to him. After spending years of his life ignored by other people, Naruto had long tried to imitate their ways – of walking, speaking, everything really. This meant that Naruto had to stand closer to people than was normal so he could mimic them better. It was a trait that annoyed most people, but he didn't care. He had to know how people worked, because however he did things, it was clearly the wrong way. Why else would nearly everybody in Konoha reject him? If he knew how to mimic them, he could be like them, and surely if everybody saw he wasn't so different he'd be accepted. But now that he could fight people instead of simply watching them, he could work out even better how they moved and reacted. Fighting was a much easier way to learn about people, particularly if they automatically assumed you were their enemy anyway.

Turning around to speak to Hinata again, Naruto did a double-take when he realised that she didn't look so happy anymore. Running over the things that he'd said immediately before, he eventually worked out that she was probably sad about Shikamaru's words.

It was a lie, of course. He'd elected not to get too close to Hinata since the incident on the first day (he was well aware that girls' tolerence of his close proximity was small) but even from afar he could tell that she was fairly nice to everyone, even the brutish older children and tormentors like Shikamaru. Naruto's fists balled up. He would've challenged his sardonic classmate to a fight had he not left so soon.

_I've gotta do something,_ Naruto thought. _Hinata's not like me. She __**believes**__ what that jerk says! _

Hinata looked at her feet forlornly. She'd been told time and again by her minders that a Hyuga could not show great displays of emotion in public, and as a member of the Hyuga she had to be strong – it was her duty to the clan. She wished she could be like Naruto, shrugging all the taunts of his classmates off like they were nothing and free of her family, but she wasn't that strong. She couldn't escape her clan...

_I wonder what clan Naruto belongs to…I wonder if I can go join them instead?_

Naruto's mind raced as he thought of what he could do to cheer Hinata up.

_...what would Iruka do if I were this sad? Give me ramen?...no, that's stupid, I don't have any ramen with me, and I'm not sure if Hinata even likes it. He'd...he'd hug me._

_Alright, I'll try that! I've never hugged a girl before. Here goes..._

Naruto swallowed in preperation. He leaned forward to Hinata, awkwardly put his hands around her and pulled inwards, as Iruka always did.

Hinata's eyes widened in shock. It was rare for her to be hugged. Her father had never done so, her minders were forbidden, and Anko preferred to pat her on the head. She wished they all would more often (or at all), because with Naruto's arms wrapped around her she felt better, like Shikamaru's words didn't matter so much. It was almost the same feeling as her mother holding her when she was younger, but at the same time there was something different about it.

_This is going okay_, Naruto thought. _Heck, it's not half bad! I wish more girls would be so cool with me hugging them!_

It was nice for him to be this close to someone without even thinking of studying their movements. Feeling her shivering decrease, Naruto carefully held the girl, grinning as his plan worked. (Had he been paying closer attention he'd have noticed that her heart rate had gone up rapidly, but if Sasuke Uchiha was the Academy's sharpest knife in the drawer, Naruto Uzumaki was its spoon.)

Letting her calm down, Naruto then carefully ended the hug. He considered saying 'there there' but then deemed it unnecessary, and quietly pulled his arms back to his sides, happy that Hinata seemed less likely to cry.

"Thankyou," said Hinata, bowing her head slightly.

"That's okay," replied Naruto. "You shouldn't believe what that guy says. He's a jerk and an idiot."

Hinata smiled weakly and nodded.

"You're nice, Hinata," he said, "And you shouldn't let guys like that push you around. _He's_ not the kinda person you wanna be like, you know?"

"Be…like?"

"I _know_ people think I'm weird," he said, "But I won't be forever. Someday, I'm gonna be Hokage, and everybody in Konoha's gonna accept me! I'll be just like all of them!"

For a second, all the world was still, and then Hinata's heart went into overtime as she grabbed Naruto's arm and quickly, sharply and loudly shouted:

"NO!"

The unnatural stillness of the air vanished, and Hinata was left with a very shocked-looking Naruto, his arm gripped by hers.

"Uh…Hinata…c-could you let go of my arm?" he asked politely, now a little nervous.

_How could she move that fast?!_

Hinata gasped a little as she looked down.

"S-sorry," she said.

Relinquishing her grip on his arm, she said quietly:

"It's just that…well…the first day, when I was lost, no matter what I did, everybody just passed me by."

_I know __**that**__ feeling,_ thought Naruto.

"A-and…and I only got to school because two people helped me. The first was a kind, brave, very strong ninja. A-and the other one was you."

Naruto frowned.

"You don't think I'm strong?" he asked.

"N-no," she said, then corrected herself: "I mean, no, I think you're strong! But, I mean…if you and her were like everyone else in the village, you wouldn't have helped me. So…maybe it's good to be like you are now…and people will learn to accept you."

Naruto reflected on this for a second.

"Woah," he said.

Hinata's tears were disappearing.

_I don't want you to change, Naruto._ Was that a selfish thing to think? Was she being obsessive to want him to stay exactly as he was, even though he thought it would mean he'd never be accepted?

_No_, she thought. _Someday, everybody in Konoha will see what a great person you are. And you won't have to change at all._

Looking deep in thought at this, Naruto looked all the more resolved when he spoke again.

"You're really smart, Hinata," he said. "…can I ask you a question?"

"Of course!" said Hinata immediately.

"Well…" began Naruto. "See…you're a girl, so you might know…d'you…"

He closed his eyes in concentration, and Hinata sat forward in concern.

_He trusts me enough to tell me important things…_

"…d'you think Sakura Haruno likes me?"

The words did not echo in Hinata's mind; they slammed into it like an all-piercing arrow, the shock almost winding her. Hinata's eyes blinked more and more as she processed this, while Naruto continued speaking.

"I want her to be my girlfriend," he admitted.

Feeling proud that he'd admitted this vital secret to somebody, Naruto opened his eyes to find…nobody.

"Huh?!" he verbalised.

In front of him was Hinata's lunchbox, clean and tidy, in sharp contrast to Naruto's rice-filled mess. There was a patch of grass that had been flattened where Hinata had sat, and there was a dandelion that she'd been playing with. And yet, the girl herself was gone.

Naruto growled.

"Trust a _girl_ to leave when you really need her," said Naruto in deference to his age's proud history of institutionalised sexism, but his heart wasn't really in it.

Picking up Hinata's lunchbox along with his own and closing it, he stood up and carefully prodded the dandelion with his foot. Staring up at his classroom window, he saw a clock reading 1:50 and frowned. Only five minutes until taijutsu class.

That was nowhere near enough time to fight with anyone.

* * *

It was some time before Hinata stopped running; she was far away from the Academy by the time she stopped. Wiping the tears that collected on her eyes as she walked, she found herself in a place full of trees, one that she remembered strongly from her childhood. She and her mother had gone here when she was still alive. Even now, Hinata often returned there when she she felt upset.

Walking to the tallest tree there was - old, extremely thick, with many branches – Hinata climbed up onto the first branch, then onto the next one, finding a hollow that was about the right size for her. It was smooth, free of dirt or bugs, and Hinata slid into it quietly. From here, she could simply sit and take stock of things.

_Shikamaru is wrong_, she thought. _I'm not weak. I just don't…_

That thought was broken by another one.

_Naruto said he wanted to be Sakura Haruno's boyfriend…_

That this troubled her more than Shikamaru's insults intrigued Hinata. Wasn't he so happy when he said it? Hadn't he almost _glowed_ when he admitted that to her, like he'd been given all the ramen in the world?Like he was one massive step closer to becoming Hokage?

_Why should I feel bad about something…someone, that makes Naruto happy? He's got such a hard life, and he deserves to have someone who's…he…_

This thought made Hinata cry again – not the silent weeping that she'd done before while running, but loud, deep sobs. What was wrong? How could she be crying when something was finally going right for her friend?

Suddenly, a voice – male, much older than Hinata – sounded out from above.

"Other people are using this tree, you know," the voice remarked.

Hinata stifled her crying, swallowed and said:

"Sorry."

"Are you crying for a reason, or are you just playing a game?"

"N-no. I mean, yes, I am crying for a reason. Sorry."

The voice shifted above. "You've said that already."

"S-…" Hinata concentrated. "Yes. I did."

The voice said: "I usually prefer to be alone, but I might be able to help you with your problem. That is, if you can reach me."

"R-reach you?"

"Climb up."

Hinata looked up. All she saw were branches; no sign of the mysterious other person.

"I-I'm not sure I can," she said.

"Go on," encouraged the voice, "try it."

Hinata swallowed again, wiped her eyes and pulled herself up from her hollow. Breathing out carefully, she began to climb, pulling herself up onto a higher branch. Standing on this one, she looked to two others above, both fairly thin, and chose the one on the right. Gingerly she crept forward, and put a little of her weight onto the right-hand branch with her leg. The branch creaked loudly.

_Bad idea_, she thought, clinging onto the thick branch. She then tried the left-hand branch and found it was much sturdier. Walking across it, she pulled herself further up, finding another branch to bring her even higher.

Here, however, the branches stopped for a time, and all there was was the blank trunk of the tree and the leaves far above. Hinata breathed in and out and thought on this.

_Perhaps I could climb the trunk?_

Stepping towards it, she began to put her hand in a hole in the trunk, then immediately realised there could be spiders or birds in there. Rapidly pulling her hand away, she pulled a pencil out of her pocket and poked it into the hole. When nothing responded, she took the pencil out and put her hand in it; she was fine. Concentrating again, she pulled herself up to the next hole.

It was rough, difficult work, and Hinata was very tired by the end of it, but she managed to climb up the trunk and to the next set of branches. From here it was easy, and she almost bound up the tree like it was a flight of stairs, finally reaching the tallest, sturdiest branch – all above that was just twigs, basically. Grinning at her success, she called out to the mysterious voice.

"M-mister?" she said. "I got to the highest branch, but you're not here."

"Aren't I?" came the voice from behind her.

Hinata gasped and turned around to see a tall, grey-haired man, perhaps a little older than Anko, standing upside-down on the one branch even higher than hers. He was dressed in a green jacket with a red spiral on it and blue pants, and he wore a Leaf Village headband on his forehead, although unlike Anko's it covered one of his eyes. The uncovered eye looked at her evenly.

"Wh…you're…you're standing upside down!" said Hinata in surprise.

"Yes," the man said, patiently. "I originally tried drinking tea upside down as well, but you can imagine how that went. That bird's never really forgiven me."

Swinging away from Hinata, the man bent his knees and pushed himself into a sitting position on the branch. He then turned around to face her, his grey hair still pointing upward bouffantly, and spoke.

"Well," he said, "Have you forgotten your problem yet?"

The physical stress of the climb disappeared as Hinata remembered both of her problems, and she sighed.

"I guess not," said the man. "Alright, what is it?"

"It's just…there's a boy in my class who keeps teasing me."

"And?" said the man.

"…he says I'm weak."

"Are you?" the ninja asked.

"I don't know," said Hinata. "I guess I'm not very good at taijutsu class...and people seem to not always hear me the first time I say something."

The man considered this.

"You'redefinitely a Hyuga."

"Because of my eyes?" asked Hinata, wearily.

"No, because only a Hyuga can look so gracefully downtrodden. The rest of us, well-"

"Why do people keep saying that?" asked Hinata. "Anko and Iruka-sensei have both said it as well. Why does everyone think my family's different?"

The grey-haired ninja closed his eyes in concentration.

_How to explain clan politics to a little girl..._

"Well," he said, "Your clan is very big, right? It has a lot of members."

"Uh-huh," said Hinata.

"It's also very rich," said the ninja, "And powerful. Now, do you know of the other clans in Konoha?"

"Yes," said Hinata. "Like the Inuzuka."

"The Inuzuka clan is actually a very good example here," said the man. "Its members are strong, but it only has three actual ninja. Compare that with the Aburame or the Nara, which have maybe seventy members each, or your clan, which has about a hundred members. Do you think that maybe the Inuzuka might feel kind of inferior, seeing as they're a legitimate clan but so understaffed?"

Hinata thought back to the second day of school, and how angry Kiba had been when Shino had suggested his clan was the smallest.

"You see, the clans are split," said the ninja, "based which of the two most powerful clans in Konoha they tend to side with - the Hyuga or the Uchiha. The Yamanaka, Nara and Akimichi clans side with the Uchiha, whereas the Inuzuka and Aburame side with the Hyuga."

"Th-that makes sense," she said. "Because Kiba Inuzuka and Shino Aburame are nice to me, but Shikamaru Nara hates me."

"Maybe," the ninja considered, "But it could just be coincidence. The clans only _roughly_ follow that pattern – the Inuzuka might side with the Yamanaka on something, for example. And besides, the clans are more _allies_ than friends. 'Friends' implies they like each other, whereas these alliances are for the clan's benefit."

"Then we can't be friends," said Hinata. "If our clans aren't allies."

"Oh, I wouldn't say it's as certain as that. And there's more to it as well. See, the Nara are richer than the Inuzuka – every clan is – but they're still not as influential as the Hyuga or the Uchiha. So, there's friction between the two groups. It doesn't help that the Hyuga have a reputation for acting like they own the village."

"We own a quarter of it," protested Hinata.

The ninja raised an eyebrow.

"You see?"

"S-sorry, sensei."

The ninja waved a hand.

"No, that's my point. Sometimes when something frustrates somebody and it's too powerful for them to confront, the frustrated person often takes their anger out on a scapegoat - somebody who can't fight back. Shikamaru Nara is trying to make himself feel better by insulting you because he can't fight the Hyuga clan itself, although what they did to him specifically I can't say."

"I see," Hinata said. "But...how can I make Shikamaru stop insulting me?"

"You just want him to stop?" the ninja asked. "You don't want revenge on him?"

"N-no," said Hinata. "I'd rather be friends with him. That's better, isn't it?"

_So innocent,_ thought the ninja.

"That's a very naïve thing to think," he said, and Hinata saddened.

He then continued:

"But, it's a naïve thing that's worth fighting for."

Hinata was not certain, but she thought she saw him smile under the mask over his mouth.

"Now," he said, "generally, if you want a boy's respect, you should defeat him in battle. That's not exactly possible at your age, but maybe-"

"Taijutsu class!" Hinata realised out loud, then started to apologise for interrupting.

"No, that would work," said the man. "If you beat him in taijutsu class, you might well prove to him you're not weak, not a scapegoat, _and_ that not every Hyuga thinks they're better."

Hinata nodded, then thought aloud again:

"I'm not sure I can beat him, though," she said. "I'm not very good at taijutsu."

"Maybe," said the ninja. "But you didn't think you could climb the tree either, did you?"

With this, he leapt away.

Smiling, Hinata climbed down the rest of the way, scrambling down branches, bounding past the hollow and landing on the ground.

* * *

"Yamanaka, Ino," finished Iruka.

"Here!"

The roll taken, Iruka set it down and breathed in deeply. In front of him, the expressions of the first year students varied. Kiba was grinning, Shino stoic, Naruto was determined and Sasuke was stoically determined. Ino and Sakura were both shuffling their feet somewhat, clearly not at all comfortable with the imminent lesson. Choji looked somewhat at a loose end (Iruka had finally successfully convinced him to forgo eating for the class), while Shikamaru stared on, bored as ever.

"Today in taijutsu class, we're going to apply what we've learned so far to fighting again. Can anybody tell me what taijutsu is?"

Naruto's hand shot up.

"Iruka-sensei! I know, I know!"

Shikamaru sneered at Naruto's enthusiasm.

"What, are you filling in for Hinata?"

"I'm here!"

Everybody turned around to see Hinata Hyuga, smiling, and standing taller than she ever had for the briefest of moments. The moment then passed, and she quietly looked down and said:

"S-sorry for interrupting, Iruka-sensei."

Iruka nodded.

"Go on, Naruto."

"Taijutsu is hand-to-hand combat, the main ninja skill! Every ninja has to learn taijutsu before they can learn any other kind of ninja technique!"

"Fairly accurate," said Iruka, "Although taijutsu is only the beginning of ninja skills, it's really the foundation of everything we learn. Everybody has to learn it first."

_Hmm,_ thought Hinata. _Why taijutsu? The other techniques don't seem so hard…but I suppose every ninja has to be good at fighting._

"Now, what style of taijutsu have we learned so far?" asked Iruka.

Sasuke Uchiha's hand went up.

"Yes, Sasuke?"

"Iruka-sensei, we've learned Whirling Leaf Taijutsu, the standard taijutsu of Konohagakure."

"Correct, Sasuke."

Naruto was heard to quietly mutter 'show-off'.

Iruka pulled out a list.

"We're now going to spar. I've ranked every member in the class in terms of fighting ability. You'll be paired up with someone of a similar level to you, and you'll practice using the Whirling Leaf taijutsu. If you want to stop at any time during sparring, say "I admit defeat", and the fight will be over."

Iruka then began to call out names, and one by one the students left. Hinata zoned out until he called out "Uzumaki, Naruto".

"You're fighting Choji Akimichi."

"Huh?" Naruto looked confused. "Iruka-sensei, I wanna fight Kiba! We're about equal at fighting!"

Iruka sighed.

"Naruto, you fought with Kiba yesterday, and the day before that. The only reason you didn't fight the day before _that_ was because it was the weekend!"

"We fought on Sunday as well!" said Naruto defensively.

"And Saturday?" asked Iruka dryly.

"Not Saturday," said Naruto. "Kiba was out with his family."

"Uh, yeah, about that…" said Kiba, awkward. "I was...kind of fighting somebody else."

"What?!" asked Naruto in anger. "How could you do that? I thought we agreed to fight each other at least once a day!"

"Look, fighting you is good and everything, but I don't wanna get stuck in a rut where I only fight one person forever," said Kiba.

"How could you say that?!" asked Naruto indignantly.

"I still _prefer_ fighting you!" Kiba protested.

"Well it's _nice_ to hear that sometimes!" said Naruto, upset.

"Naruto, you're fighting Choji," said Iruka decisively. "Kiba, you're fighting Shino."

"Shino Aburame?" asked Kiba. "He's weird!"

"Just go to the practice mats," said Iruka wearily, and continued until he reached Hinata's name.

"Hinata Hyuga, you're paired with Sakura Haruno; Shikamaru Nara, you're paired with Ino Yamanaka."

"What?" asked Ino. "He's a boy!"

"Well spotted," noted Shikamaru.

"Shikamaru is the lowest-ranked male student in terms of taijutsu ability," said Iruka.

"Sensei," said Sakura, "Who's the lowest-ranked girl?"

Iruka consulted the list and said:

"Uh, let's not worry about that for now. Just practice, and have a try, and…stuff."

Iruka stepped away.

_Good,_ thought Hinata. _Once I defeat Sakura, I must fight Shikamaru, and...oh, I can't fight Shikamaru; I probably can't even fight Sakura! _

_Sakura...Naruto's...N..._

Hinata closed her eyes for a few seconds, stifling another sob that was rising up from her throat. Swallowing, she opened her eyes again, and suddenly the entire world went _different_ for a second. A hole appeared wherever she looked; staring at Iruka's back, she could see the ranked list of students . Her eyes scanning down the list, she saw the last few names –

_6. Ino Yamanaka _

_7. Sakura Haruno _

_8. Hinata Hyuga_.

There were none below those. Sharply breathing in, the world returned to its normal shade, and Hinata was left with one realisation.

_I __**am**__ the worst in the class_, she thought.

"What is it?" asked Sakura.

"I…I'm the lowest-ranked girl," said Hinata quietly.

"How do you know?" asked Ino.

"Um…well, I…I saw the other side of the list earlier," Hinata lied quickly.

"Well," commented Shikamaru. "I guess we're finally _equal_, huh?"

With this, he walked away. Ino shrugged and followed him, leaving Hinata and Sakura to face one another.

Hinata bowed.

"Good luck, Sakura," she said.

"You're wishing me good luck at beating you?" asked Sakura.

Hinata considered this.

"Oh. Yes," she said. "Whoops."

_That's weird_, thought Sakura. _Usually Hinata apologises for everything._

They walked to their practice mat and stood at either end, looking at one another and trying to ignore the other students' fighting.

_This mat is all there is now_, thought Hinata. _All there is. And the only thing that matters now is that I don't lose immediately._

Sakura placed one foot forward. Hinata did the same.

Through an unspoken agreement, the fight began.

It started with a quick, jabbing kick from Sakura that Hinata barely dodged, the pink-haired kunoichi's leg flying past her stomach and into the air as she leaned sideways to avoid it. Hinata then struck forward and Sakura pulled back, blocking Hinata's punch. Both breathing out quickly, they traded blows and this time both of them connected; Sakura was hit in the arm, Hinata in the chest. Hinata was pushed backwards by the blow, falling to the mat.

_She's so much stronger than me_, thought Hinata. _No wonder Naruto wants her to be his girlfriend, he's __**obsessed**__ with fighting! How can he love me when I'm the lowest ra-…_

_Love?!_

Hinata's eyes widened, and she made no movements.

Sakura looked on in concern.

"Hinata? Are you okay? Do you wanna stop?"

_Love? Do I…what?! How could I…he's nice, yes, but…but he's…I…_

_Love?!_

Suddenly, everything that Shikamaru Nara had ever said to her was replaced by everything she'd ever seen Naruto Uzumaki do, everything he'd ever said to her or to anyone else – the stupid things, the happy things, the sad things, and those bright flashes of brilliant wisdom that he always pulled out at the last minute, the last second even, because she knew that somewhere under all that bright yellow hair and goofy, repeatedly regrown smile was a boy who was nearly perfect.

Nobody else in Konoha could see this. Nobody else could see…

The feeling welled up inside of her heart for so long it felt like centuries, but then it changed. It spread from her heart to her head, where it got so warm and so bright, and then it flew forward to her eyes – glowing, brilliant, radiant like the sun, Hinata's vision flashed, her hands clasped together in a seal, and a single word broke free of her lips.

"_Byakugan_."

Her vision blurred again, but then it became clearer, and everything was visible. Two boys fighting, in front of her. Ino and Shikamaru fighting, _behind her_. Iruka standing far away, _behind Ino and Shikamaru_. Every speck of dust floating in the afternoon air was visible to her, and she honestly felt that if she practiced this power, she would be able to see everything in the world.

"Uh…Hinata?" said Sakura. "Your eyes are all…vein-y. Are you doing a ninjutsu?"

Hinata sharply breathed out, and the world went back to normal. She sat on the practice mat, blinking in thought.

"I don't know," she admitted.

"Well..." said Sakura, "...I'm gonna go take a break for a moment, 'kay?"

Hinata could not help but notice that this break coincided with the victory of Sasuke Uchiha against Kiyoshi Kinoko. Nodding in acceptance, Hinata watched as Sakura walked off to speak to Sasuke. She then heard Ino Yamanaka rapidly say "I admit defeat!", then race off after her friend. Hinata stood up and looked back to the practice mat behind her to see Shikamaru standing alone, still with a look of contempt in his eyes.

_Here's my chance_, she thought.

She stepped forward to speak to him, but he noticed her looking at him first.

"_What_?" he asked her.

"Uh...um..." she began.

"Tch," he said, rolling his eyes. "That's _another_ thing. You always speak so quiet so people ask you to say things twice so you get more attention. It's really _low_ of y-"

"Fight me!" Hinata burst out.

Shikamaru looked confused.

"Huh?"

She tried again.

"W-will you fight me?"

Shikamaru's brows knotted together in thought for a few moments. Then he shrugged.

"I...guess?"

_This is not quite what I'd hoped for_, thought Hinata. _I hope I don't lose immediately...no! I have to win! If I win, then Shikamaru will respect me, and maybe Naruto will see how good I am at fighting and...well, we'll see how much he cares about Sakura Haruno after that!_

Hinata bowed to Shikamaru and dropped into a fighting stance. Shikamaru sighed and lazily stepped into a similar stance, apparently weary despite the fact that Ino was a pushover.

"Let's get this over with," he said annoyedly.

_I don't know why he said that_, thought Hinata. _He's the lowest-ranked boy...then again, I'm the lowest ranked girl._

For a moment, all was still.

Then Shikamaru stepped forward quickly, eyes still on Hinata, shifting slightly from foot to foot. She crouched slightly and returned his gaze. Still shifting, Shikamaru breathed out slightly, and it all started with a kick.

Hinata gasped out with pain as the kick hit her in the side and knocked her off balance – she had reacted fast, but not fast enough. Stepping back, she crouched again, legs wide to give a strong base of attack.

He struck again, this time with the other leg, air whooshing around it as it flew just over Hinata's head. Hinata struck him in the chest with her right hand, palm open, putting him yet further back. What was she doing?

She withdrew her palm and crouched again, but this time she was not still. Kneeling and turning around at the same time, her left leg swept across at Shikamaru.

_She's trying to sweep my legs_, thought Shikamaru. _Clever._

He jumped up to avoid Hinata's leg. Still in the air, he kicked down at Hinata's shoulder, making her cry out in pain and fall over completely. Sprawled on the ground, Hinata breathed heavily as Shikamaru landed a little further back.

"Do you admit defeat?" he suggested.

_I should,_ thought Hinata. _He's better at taijutsu than I thought...if he's the worst boy in the class at it, what chance do I have against any of the others – against Naruto?_

The thought of Naruto brought strength to Hinata, and she got up again, struggling to her feet.

"I don't believe it," he said. "Do you have a death wish?"

"Y-...you're not going to kill me," she asserted.

Shikamaru laughed cruelly.

"I guess the Hyuga don't teach you metaphors," he said.

Hinata kept her stance, but spoke again.

"Sh-Shikamaru...why do you hate me so much?"

He shook his head and smirked.

"Hate you? I don't hate you. You're not worth hating. You're just a waste of my time."

Hinata's eyes wavered.

_I can't change what he thinks...I can't, it's...I..._

"What, are you going to cry now?" asked Shikamaru.

_I won't let him beat me. I can't let him say that! I'm not weak!_

More resolved than ever, Hinata stopped crouching. Standing up straight, she waved her fringe out of her face and stood in her same fighting stance.

"No," she responded. "I'm going to beat you."

Shikamaru sighed in annoyance again, and took his stance.

Hinata wiped one of her eyes and smiled.

"Good luck," she said.

Again, Shikamaru began the fight with a kick, but this time Hinata was ready. Dodging past it with a speed she'd never before managed, she responded with a punch of her own, a strike to the chest that made Shikamaru stumble back and almost fall himself, only narrowly regaining his balance.

"Where'd that come from?" he thought out loud.

Reservedly, careful of Hinata's newfound strength, Shikamaru put his left foot forward again and focused on his opponent. She was still standing there, ready to fight, but she had not struck him while he was off-balance. That had been…decent of her.

Something had changed within Hinata Hyuga, and he wanted to find out what it was.

Bowing slightly, Hinata and Shikamaru's fists flew as they joined in battle once more.

* * *

A few mats over, Sasuke Uchiha was leaning against a wall, trying to avoid the attentions of Ino Yamanaka and Sakura Haruno. Both were sitting quite close to him, staring adoringly upward as he tried to ignore them and focus on the wall in front of him. He wasn't sure exactly _why_ girls were so interested in him – his minders had only laughed knowingly when he asked them – but he still had to deal with their nonsense on a daily basis. There was apparently something called 'Valentines' Day' coming up in a few months that every girl was talking about, and from his studies he'd discovered that the exchange of cards, gifts and kissing were all important parts of the holiday. He thought it all seemed pointless. A card was a waste of paper that might be used for taking notes, gifts were only good for pleasing other clans, and kissing…well, he'd never experienced it but it seemed a very odd activity to him. Glancing down worriedly for a moment at Sakura and Ino, he realised that they might even try to kiss _him_, an idea that admittedly intrigued him – but for research purposes, of course.

His train of thought was broken by the quick arrival of Kiba Inuzuka. Kiba was a stockier, rougher boy than Sasuke, and his mother had warned him repeatedly not to play with him. Sasuke wasn't about to; Kiba was sort of an idiot. Other boys his mother warned him away from were Naruto Uzumaki (who was so impulsive he'd knocked _himself_ out in his bout with Choji), Neji Hyuga (who was apparently very dangerous despite being only seven) and Purazuma Uchiha (a distant cousin). He was also told not to speak with Hinata Hyuga, a quiet girl that seemed very smart, but in his opinion she was little but a scaredy-cat, so this wasn't much of a loss.

"Everybody!" Kiba announced to the world at large, "Hinata's fighting Shikamaru!"

This brought the class' attention to the dog-ninja, who grinned happily at the news.

"Hinata's fighting?" asked Sakura. "Hinata never fights. Neither does Shikamaru."

Kiba pointed away to the duo's mat, where the children were trading blows at considerable speed.

"Huh," said Sakura, surprised.

"Who cares about fighting?" asked Ino out loud. "The _real_ important fight is over, right Sasuke?"

"Actually, I kind of want to watch this," said the Uchiha boy. He was curious to see what could have inspired the scaredy-cat to finally challenge Shikamaru.

"Good idea, Sasuke!" said Sakura. "Let's go!"

Kiba, Sasuke and Choji left their practice mats, Ino and Sakura squabbling as they went.

Naruto finally sat up.

"Hey," he said, "What's going on? Where you all going?"

The children that would have answered Naruto were too far away (or otherwise occupied) and the children that wouldn't have answered him didn't, so his question hung in the air for a bit. No answer forthcoming, Naruto got up and ran to join the crowd of students standing around a practice mat. He didn't get it. Who was fighting who?

_...Hinata and Shikamaru! I'm glad she's okay! But where did she go, and why's she fighting him now?_

_Aah, who cares, as long as Shikamaru loses I'm happy!_

"Go Hinata!" Naruto cried out. "Kick his butt!"

His words of encouragement fired Hinata up further, and she struck again at Shikamaru, fist flying through the air towards his shoulder. Sliding back, he charged again, feet and arms narrowly missing Hinata as she dodged and blocked them.

_What happened to her?!_ He thought. _No girl's this good at fighting!_

Shikamaru slashed at the Hyuga with his arm and once again met with nothing but air. Cursing, he tried to block a kick from her but ended up sliding back and falling to the ground. He breathed in and out rapidly. Was that sweat forming on his brow? He couldn't believe it. He was actually exerting himself in taijutsu class!

Looking back up at his opponent, he realised that she didn't seem to particularly care that he was on the mat. Not once had she invited him to give up, as he had suggested with her. All she ever did was smile – not smirk, _smile_ – at him, encouragingly. She wasn't taunting him by letting him get up over and over. She was trying to prove something to him, and maybe to herself.

"What's your motive?" he asked aloud, half to himself and half to her. "You've knocked me down about three times now, but you've never told me to give up."

"Y-you shouldn't give up," she responded, still standing quite tall.

Watching a few metres away, Sakura commented to Ino:

"That girl's got a _problem_ with encouraging her enemies."

Hearing this, Hinata looked to Sakura and said:

"H-he's not my enemy. He's my classmate, and we should help each other."

The class, formerly rowdy and interested in the fight, fell silent at this. As they pondered it, Hinata walked over to Shikamaru and held out her hand. Acting cautiously, Shikamaru looked from her hand to her face and back again. There was no treachery in her eyes, he knew that.

Shikamaru carefully grabbed onto Hinata's hand and was pulled up. Surprised again at her strength, he leaned over and looked down at her again.

"I admit defeat," he said.

There rose an almighty cheer from the assorted crowd of other students. Naruto and Kiba headbutted in satisfaction, Choji opened the chocolate bar he'd hidden in his shoe to celebrate, and Sakura and Ino looked oddly proud at Hinata's success. Even Sasuke Uchiha had to admit, Hinata Hyuga _was_ kind of cool.

For a scaredy-cat.

* * *

"You were careless," Orora Hyuga accused.

Struggling hard not to tell the Hyuga where exactly he could stick it and mostly succeeding, Iruka leaned on his desk and sighed.

"I _told_ you," he said, "I just had to leave them for a few minutes; some older genin were trying to sneak beer onto school grounds."

Orora snorted at this. A clan member of the main house, Orora was tall and thin, even for a Hyuga, which was to his advantage as he could easily look down his nose on virtually everybody. Dressed in the omnipresent Hyuga robes, he saw straight-backed in his chair and observed Iruka with a combination of contempt and polite interest.

"Most of them were done fighting anyway," continued Iruka. "And I didn't expect Hinata of all people to challenge Shikamaru."

"Indeed," confirmed the clan member. "Hinata leaves much to be desired as the clan heir. She suffers from both a lack of confidence and a lack of propriety."

Thinking of the girl who apologised for virtually everything, Iruka wondered what exactly Orora's standards for propriety _were_.

"She is known to be the worst at taijutsu in the class," said Orora, "and yet she quite successfully defeated the Nara clan member using Whirling Leaf form, is that correct?"

Iruka nodded.

"How is that possible?" asked Orora.

"Shikamaru is the lowest-ranked boy in the class," explained Iruka.

"Even so," stated the Hyuga, "there is no valid reason for why she was able to defeat him now and not earlier. If she has shown no proficiency in previous taijutsu classes, how could she do so spontaneously here?"

"Whirling Leaf is a fairly simple style," admitted Iruka. "Maybe it just finally clicked for her."

"A simplistic style is easily predicted," criticised Orora.

"It's also easier to learn," replied Iruka, defensively. "These children are six years old; they're not going to be taijutsu masters at this stage in life."

"They cannot become adequate at taijutsu without a thorough grounding in full, _complex_ styles," lectured Orora. "If Hinata is to lead the main house with the dignity and ability it requires, she must learn more difficult forms. After all, if she could pick up Whirling Leaf spontaneously…"

"I don't think that's why it happened-" began Iruka, but Orora had already stood up.

"Thankyou, Iruka-san," said the Hyuga minder. "I am sure that Hinata will progress sufficiently now that you have brought this to my attention."

Iruka looked down at his desk and tried not to glare. The sheer arrogance of that bastard! He didn't know what went on in the Hyuga compound, but he was deeply concerned for Hinata, whatever happened. Still…from the descriptions of the fight he'd gotten from the other students, she had fought amazingly. Once she'd gotten going, Shikamaru had apparently barely touched her, and several students had stressed that he really did seem to be trying to win.

Meanwhile, outside Iruka's office, Hinata sat on a chair her legs dangling above the ground. She quietly stared forward, slightly bruised from her bout but still happy at her success. Hearing the sound of voices coming down the hall, she looked up to see Kiba, Naruto and Shikamaru. The two shorter boys were walking beside Shikamaru, as if escorting a prisoner.

"Hey, Hinata," said Kiba. "He said he wants to talk with you."

He gestured with his head to Shikamaru, who stepped forward slightly. Hinata pulled her feet up onto the chair, curled up as if in a ball. Sighing, but refraining from stating what a drag this was, Shikamaru spoke.

"I'm…sorry," he said, looking anywhere but at Hinata herself. "You're not weak. I don't think I would've held out as long as you did, myself."

Shikamaru looked back down at the ground and shuffled his feet a little. Hinata nodded and made a very quiet noise, which Shikamaru took to be an acceptance of his apology. Carefully walking away, the three remaining students who were left all watched him go, then turned their attentions to each other. Kiba looked to Naruto, then Hinata.

_They both look sad,_ he thought. _That's weird. Naruto loves watching fights almost as much as he loves being in them, and Hinata just won. You'd think they'd be talking about things a lo-…_

Suddenly, Kiba thought back to what had happened at lunchtime. Naruto had disappeared for a while, but he'd later been spotted sitting next to Hinata and eating lunch with her on a small hill. Normally, minor teasing would have ensued once both of them had returned from lunch, but Hinata's unusual absence and depressed-looking demeanor meant that nobody quite had the heart to sing the 'sitting in a tree' song at either of them. Glancing from the blond boy, who was scratching the back of his neck in awkwardness, to Hinata who was all bunched up in her seat, Kiba finally came to the right conclusion.

_They like each other!_ he thought. _He must've caught cooties off her or something. Still, better get out before I get infected…give them some alone time._

"We-ell," he said, yawning dramatically, "I, uh…hafta…go and get some new…dog collars."

Both of his fellow students looked at him as if he were mad. He laughed nervously.

"Yeah, uh, bye."

The jacketed boy quickly left the corridor, humming to himself.

The two now alone, they spent a good thirty seconds almost catching one anothers' gaze but just missing before Naruto spoke.

"H-hinata," said Naruto. "Are…are you okay?"

Hinata looked up at him, trying not to cry. Naruto immediately started speaking very quickly.

"It's just that at lunchtime you left and I wasn't sure why and I was really worried and I couldn't find you anywhere and then you came back for taijutsu class and you were really strong and awesome and I liked how you fought Shikamaru."

Hinata tried to focus.

_I want to tell him…I want to tell him…I want to tell him how I feel now…_

"I-I…" she began, but suddenly the door opened.

Orora Hyuga stepped out of Iruka's office and looked down at the watery-eyed girl curled up on a chair. His violet eyes then wandered over to a short boy with bright blond hair and a light t-shirt.

_The container of the Nine-Tailed Fox_, thought Orora. _Surely they are not…_

The boy scratched the side of his head again.

"Uh…I'll be goin' now, then," he said nervously, cautious of Orora's piercing gaze.

Hinata looked sad at this, but quietly accepted it.

"Come along, Hinata," said Orora. "Tomorrow, you begin your Gentle Fist training."

_Gentle Fist!_ thought Hinata. _The Hyuga clan taijutsu…but I'm still the worst in my class…_

Slowly standing, Hinata reluctantly began walking down the hallway. Orora hovered the customary few steps behind her, watching to make sure she made no errors of judgement. She had not quite reached the door, however, when Naruto called out again.

"Hey, wait!" he shouted.

Hinata turned to see him running towards her. He stopped just in time to avoid running into either Hyuga, and pulled a small lunchbox from his pack.

"This is yours," he explained. "You didn't get it after you…after you…well, yeah, here it is now."

Handing her the lunchbox, Naruto beamed. Hinata knew that this lunchbox wasn't all that special – after all, the Hyuga probably had hundreds she could just take – but she knew how much it meant to Naruto.

"Th-thankyou," she said, her stutter breaking out again.

Nodding cheerfully, Naruto turned to leave, walking the other way down the corridor. Hands in his pockets, he felt happy that Hinata had finally taken Shikamaru down a few notches. It seemed that finally, the weird, shy girl was coming into her own. And what she'd said about not being like everyone else…well, he'd never expected Hinata to be so wise.

Hinata didn't notice, but even as she watched Naruto walk away, a feeling welled up inside of her. Not unlike the warmth she had felt when she first used the Byakugan, it spread from her heart to her hands, but there it stopped. Instead of making a hand signal, it stayed in only her two index fingers. Slowly, carefully, the fingers touched, and they moved a fraction inwards, flexing subtly. She would not realise this until someone pointed it out to her, but this was the first time she would do this.

For the first, but certainly not the last time, Hinata smiled and watched Naruto Uzumaki walk away.

* * *

D'awww! I made happy thoughts! Now we know how Naruto got his philosophy, Hinata got her finger-twiddling, and how Shikamaru upgraded from 'asshole' to 'only sort of abrasive'. I hope you liked this, the second chapter of _The Sun Kunoichi_. Tune in next week, when we finally timeskip to the start of the series proper!

Oh wow, this chapter's thirty pages long – and the last one was fourteen! Thanks for making it all this way!


	3. Divergence

Edit: Hey guys; I kinda rewrote parts of this chapter as 'pick-ups', as they call it in the movie business. (Not that I'm in the movie business, but I listen to a lot of directors' commentaries.) Sorry if you've read this chapter already; it's nothing world-changingly new, but I think what I've put in makes the chapter better. So here is Chapter Three, again.

Hey, you guys! Sorry I haven't updated for so long; I was busy with university work. Well, contrary to what the first two chapters might have suggested, this will indeed be an Adventure fic and not just fluffy NaruHina romance. There'll be friendship, action, romance, explosions, new jackets and more!

So, I present to you, the next chapter of…_The Sun Kunoichi_.

* * *

_Chapter Three: Divergence_

There are concepts in worlds that are as old as existence itself. They repeat themselves over and over in cycles, rising and falling, like the very breath of reality. They are common to all worlds, all places where anything lives. Death, love, joy and sorrow are ones you may know of; others are beyond the scope of my ability to explain.

But there is another concept. It is not one that _you_ would see or hear or taste or even experience in this world, where all that happens here is just _words_. It is not a thing that could happen in _this_ place, or even the other worlds that brush up against ours from time to time. It is not a concept that this or any other world could sustain.

Any other world save for _one_.

And in _that_ world, _that_ place, where all that happens here is not mere words (with some italicised for emphasis), the Concept lives.

* * *

It was the day after the genin exams, but Hinata was not celebrating. Shuffling through Konoha's busy streets alone, the quiet dark blue-haired girl tried to smile and nod politely when she passed others, but she couldn't quite bring herself to do it.

She had passed the exams well enough. In terms of the written test she was one of the highest-ranked students, and she had performed all ninjutsu admirably. Her taijutsu score was quite low, however; she had only won one of her two matches, and that was because she'd been lucky enough to fight Ino Yamanaka. The cold stare and silent acceptance when she had told her minder of her passing had hurt Hinata, but the real pain came before when she watched Naruto Uzumaki sitting on the swings, alone and isolated from everybody else.

_I wish Anko was here,_ thought Hinata. _She would know what to do now._

The older kunoichi had told Hinata that she would return from her mission on the day of the genin exams, but Anko had not been present in the crowd of parents and students that had gathered out in the schoolyard. Hinata supposed that Anko might not want to talk to the other parents – she was not particularly eloquent in small talk – but she had at least hoped her adoptive older sister might meet up with her after the crowds had disappeared. Alone, Hinata didn't think she had the courage to approach Naruto, to tell him that he was the greatest person she knew even if he didn't pass the exams. If Anko had been there…

…and yet, Naruto had disappeared swiftly as the wind the second time Hinata got a chance to look at him. He had been such a huge part of her life since the day she had beaten Shikamaru and realised how important Naruto was to her, and now she was without him. When even Naruto's endless optimism and energy couldn't make him a ninja, how could she do it?

Walking silently down the street, Hinata Hyuga would have completed her circuit of Konoha, then returned to the Hyuga compound. She would have found out that Naruto did pass the exams (in a sense) a few days from tomorrow, and she would have been happy, even if it was only for a moment. She would have sadly resigned herself to only seeing him occasionally, and she would have spent the next few months as she was now –disheartened and meek. But the Concept that lives in this universe rouses sometimes, reaching out through the fabric of reality, making tiny ripples in the folds of existence. These divergences are not great at first sight, but they are the falling pebble that triggers an avalanche.

The divergence that happened that day was but a whisper away from the way things should have gone. All it took was a few seconds, but the gust of wind that swept through Konoha waved open a pair of curtains, and swiftly the orange light of sunset flooded Naruto's room to the point where further sleep was impossible. It ended as soon as it began, the wind dying down again quickly, but the change was made.

Naruto _should_ have slept for much longer, but here, he woke up.

_Arrgh!_ thought Naruto as he rubbed his eyes. _What's wrong? I'm not wearing my pyjamas or my sleepy-hat!_

Naruto pulled his hand out from under his back, and realised he was still wearing his clothes from last night. That alone was unusual; ever since Sakura Haruno had teased him for not owning pyjamas on the first day of school, he had steadfastly changed into them every night, although a niggling feeling in the back of his mind insisted that he could sleep in longer the next day if he just wore his daytime-clothes to bed. He worriedly felt his forehead for his trademark goggles, but his hand was left wanting, his forehead covered only by a smooth strip of cloth and metal.

…_Cloth and metal?!_

Eyes widening, Naruto sat bolt upright, throwing the covers that Iruka had carefully tucked over him the previous night off, and dashed to his bathroom mirror, where his reflection in front of him stood, skin and hair dirty but with no scratches on him. Upon his head was a Leaf Village headband, glinting in the fading light of the day like a crown. Seeing the Leaf-Village symbol in that dazed state between consciousness and sleep suddenly brought Naruto to life again, and he remembered everything that had happened last night.

He'd beaten Mizuki, saved Iruka and returned the scroll. He'd proven them wrong. He'd cleared the first massive step to becoming Hokage.

The resulting "WOOHOO!" could be heard from the opposite side of the village.

Rushing out to the balcony outside his house, Naruto shouted to the streets below:

"I'M A NINJA! A REAL NINJA! IN YOUR _FACE_, KONOHA!"

The crowd below either ignored Naruto's bellowing or jeered nastily at him, but he ignored them out of habit and instead focused on the one person far below that seemed to be happy about his success. A short girl with dark blue hair that had been walking near Naruto's apartment stopped in her tracks and stared up at him, violet eyes radiating happiness.

_Naruto! You passed!_

Hinata looked up at the small, scruffy-looking boy and truly smiled, for the first time in many days. Gazing up at him peacefully, she was then immediately taken aback by what he did next.

"Hey, Hinata!" he shouted down at her. "I passed!"

_He's talking to me! I have to say something._

"G-great, N-Naruto!" she stammered loudly, trying not to blush furiously.

_Oh, __**brilliant**__, Hinata, _shethought_._ (She was never cuttingly sarcastic to anyone else, but within her own mind she figured it was fair game.)

"Let's get ramen together!" said Naruto.

"W-what?" asked Hinata.

He drooped a little. It figured, of course; he'd been turned down by 'friends' before. Putting on his usual brave attitude, he said:

"Uh, okay, if you don't want to-"

"NO!" Hinata shouted. "I m-mean, yes! Yes, I'll get ramen with you!"

_All-right!_ thought Naruto. _Of course, __**I**__ never thought Hinata __**wouldn't**__ go get ramen with me. Not for a second! She's the nicest person ever!_

"Okay!" said Naruto. "I'll be down in a min-"

Suddenly, he stopped in his tracks, nose twitching a little. Hinata thought this was unbearably adorable and concentrated very hard on not squeeing, while Naruto wondered.

_I smell __**really**__ bad,_ he thought. _I guess that's what happens when you spend a whole night running away from a guy and then you beat him up. Maybe I should shower first…_

"-uh, I might need more time," said Naruto, scratching his head. "I kinda stink right now."

Hinata tried to prevent herself from giggling insanely. As things to say in balcony scenes went, it was not the most romantic of lines.

"I'm gonna take a shower," he said, "but you can wait in my room 'til I'm done! I'll leave the front unlocked for you!"

He gave the thumbs up. She nodded, lacking the composure to say anything at that point.

_N-naruto…showering…_

Were Hinata a boy, she would've suffered from a nosebleed. Instead she began to feel lightheaded as Naruto turned and walked back into his room. Annoying as it was for her, this _always_ happened when she had thoughts like this. Breathing in and out slowly, she concentrated on thinking the most un-romantic thoughts possible as she walked up the stairs of the building Naruto's room was in.

_Iruka-sensei's lectures…the Hyuga elders playing ping-pong…cinnamon rolls…Naruto covered in cinnammo-NO! Whirling Leaf, Drill 2! Ram, Snake, Tiger! Ram, Snake, Tiger! _

Reaching the top of the stairs, Hinata came to an open door. The room it lead to, very much like its owner, smelled of sweat and miso and a very particular type of jacket fabric. Hinata cautiously stepped in. Naruto had invited her to wait there, so it wasn't technically trespassing, but she was still a little nervous.

The room was very, very small; Hinata's room was about four times bigger. In it was a table, a fridge and a kettle, with assorted cutlery spread out all over every available horizontal surface. A pile of well-worn textbooks sat in the corner, with a few comic books and other periodicals with names like _Real Ninja Stories_ _Magazine_ scattered about the floor and Naruto's dirty clothes in a heap.

Standing upright next to the fridge, Hinata carefully picked up the closest issue of _Real Ninja Stories Magazine_ and flicked through to one of the stories. It had apparently been written by 'Karui E. Kanshisha', and was filled with the improbable adventures of a rogue ninja called Okachisai of the North.

Hinata began to read the story and quite enjoyed it, despite the overblown narration and omnipresence of underdressed princesses who needed rescuing by Okachisai, but she quickly put the magazine back in its place when she heard Naruto approaching. He was dressed in his usual orange outfit, but she had to admit he looked more grown-up than usual with his Leaf headband affixed firmly to his forehead.

"Sorry that took a while," he said. "I had mud _all over_ me!"

Hinata started frantically repeating the hand signs for the Escape Jutsu in her head to prevent impure thoughts about Naruto being covered in mud, and managed to say:

"T-that's alright. I…read one of your magazines."

It was half making-conversation, half an admission of guilt, but instead of prompting him to say something, it made Naruto look very nervous.

"U-Uh," he said, "which one?"

"_R-r-…Real Ninja Stories,_" she got out.

Naruto visibly relaxed.

"Phew," he said. "Uh, I mean, yeah, _Real Ninja Stories_ is pretty cool. Do you read it usually?"

"No," she admitted.

"Oh, okay," Naruto said.

He put his hands into his pockets and went to the door, Hinata following. Taking his keys out for the door, he thought aloud:

"Like…if a girl was into _Real Ninja Stories_ though, that'd be the coolest thing ever."

Hinata immediately resolved to take out a subscription.

* * *

Ayame smiled as she served the ramen to the old man, who accepted it with a curt nod and left. She was not happy because he was a good customer; he complained about the service whenever he came to Ichiraku. Her grin was because Ichiraku was making exceptionally good profits lately, maybe even good enough that she might be able to leave for another land soon. Like all teenagers she was yearning to get her own place to live in, perhaps in an entire other city, but she had to sell a _lot_ of noodles to make hiring another hand a real possibility for Teuchi. So she was understandably pleased when Naruto Uzumaki AKA He Who Eats Nothing Else But Ramen showed up, accompanied by what she assumed to be a friend.

"Hi, Ayame!" said Naruto fondly. "I'll have my usual, please. What do you want, Hinata?"

The girl beside him, a Hyuga, mumbled something. He looked confused and leaned in closer to her, while she blushed and looked away. Turning to Ayame again, Naruto asked:

"Ayame, what kind of ramen should Hinata have?"

Ayame cleared her throat. Naruto could be such an idiot!

"Why don't you introduce us, first?"

The realisation hit Naruto's face like a wet, undercooked bun.

"Oh, yeah! Hinata, this is Ayame! She's been selling me ramen for a really long time! And Ayame, this is Hinata Hyuga. She's my classmate."

He nodded, then added:

"Actually, wait, no, she's not my classmate anymore. Now that we're genin, we won't be in the same class anymore, so I guess we're friends!"

His words resonating in her mind, Hinata suddenly felt conflicted by this. Of course, she had realised from the start that they couldn't be in the same class forever, but the reality of it had only just sunk in. Naruto might have passed the genin exams, but that was no guarantee that they'd be placed on the same squad.

Still…he _had_ said that they were friends…

Ayame slapped him lightly on the head for this.

"Don't be stupid!" she said. "Of course you're friends."

She looked to Hinata.

_Not like most Hyuga_, she thought. _For one, she's pretty damn shy. For another, she's actually sort of adorable._

Smiling at the girl, Ayame asked: "Hinata, do you eat much ramen?"

Hinata shook her head. Most elders of the Hyuga considered it a vulgar meal of the masses.

"Alright," Ayame said kindly, "we'll start you off with some shio. It's nice and light."

"Shio?" whined Naruto. "That's baby ramen, Ayame!"

He started to notice Hinata slump in her seat.

_Whoops_, he thought. _I forget how easy it is to make Hinata sad._

"Uh, but, good start!" he said. "Sometimes I eat shio between miso bowls so I taste the miso even more. So it's actually pretty good!"

Hinata nodded quietly.

_Man, why's Hinata always so down?_ he thought. _Is it 'cos she doesn't like me? But, when most people don't like me, they look annoyed. Hinata just looks all sad and scared at the same time. I gotta cheer her up!_

"Hey," he said, "I didn't mean it about that 'baby ramen' thing."

She nodded, and he continued.

"I mean, you've never even _had _ramen before! That's really, really amazing!"

He shook his head in disbelief.

"A-amazing?" she asked. Neither she nor anything about her had ever been called 'amazing' by anyone before.

"Yeah!" he confirmed. "I pretty much live off it! Not ever having ramen would be like…"

Suddenly, a thought crossed Naruto's mind, and he stopped beaming so widely. He frowned in perceived disgust and said:

"Wait, would baby ramen be, like, ramen made of babies?"

Naruto immediately covered his mouth with his hand, but it was too late. Hinata's expression was wide-eyed surprise, even more expressive thanks to her lack of pupils.

_Made of…_

Hinata's mouth quivered.

Naruto didn't move that much, but he suddenly looked distinctly embarrassed and uncomfortable at the same time.

She burst out laughing, the pitiable 'I'm so sorry' look on his face too much even for her composure. This laughter made Naruto smile again, and he laughed too, the two children giggling happily at Naruto's faux pas.

_Huh_, thought Naruto. _Hinata is actually kinda pretty when she's laughing._

Their meals arrived (Naruto's already a double helping), and both set to eating the noodle dishes. Hinata listened intently to Naruto's story of what had happened to him the previous night. The daring nighttime raid to steal the scroll, the dramatic battle between the two senseis, the last, vital moment where Naruto discovered how to make Shadow Clones; he sure knew how to make relentless danger sound exciting.

_No!_ Hinata scolded herself as she and Naruto began their third and sixth bowls respectively. _Naruto could've died last night! I shouldn't be so immature; he's a real person!_

And yet, she listened closely until his tale came to a close.

When it finished, Hinata sat in silent contemplation, her bowl of ramen cooling in the night air. After all those years of wondering why everyone could treat Naruto so badly – sure, he was sometimes overbearing, but he certainly wasn't the only twelve-year old boy guilty of _that_ – Hinata finally had an answer.

It was certainly an unconventional situation, she thought. Hinata knew enough about jutsu to realise that theoretically _anything_ could be sealed within any object, but giant demon foxes were admittedly somewhat outside of her area of knowledge. She assumed that people were not actually frightened of Naruto himself. If that were so, they would have been trying to keep him calm and under control, instead of the harsh treatment he received mocked and rejected him. It was rather the potential he held, the innate possibility that the eyes of a child might one day become the eyes of a monster, that made the people of Konoha wary of him.

Naruto was by no means the perfect ninja. Despite Hinata's fervent wishing for him to pass on the day before the genin exams, she had still known deep inside that it was very likely that he'd fail. Every time he had gotten a question wrong in class she had inwardly cringed, wishing she had the courage to walk over and help him where no other student would. She didn't care that he wasn't as smart as other boys, because in truth she found his cluelessness sort of cute, but could he smarten up enough to make it in the field as a real ninja? He was undoubtedly the most determined person she had ever met, an unintentional ideal and mentor to her, and that he had made six whole clones – _actual solid clones_ – was proof enough of his power. The citizens of the village were wrong to fear him, because Naruto didn't want to destroy Konoha, he wanted to rule it. But did he have what it takes to be Hokage? To be more than the average ninja, despite the fact that nearly everyone else had massive advantages in intelligence over him? Could he pay attention when lives depended on it? Most importantly, could he stop thinking about ramen for five minutes and _look at_ _her_?

Suddenly Naruto did look at Hinata, and she immediately turned away, blushing so much she swore the air around her hummed. The inquisitive look on his face erased almost all the questions from her mind for the moment, leaving her feeling like she was six years old and seeing him for the first time again.

_Well,_ she thought. _He'll certainly have the upper edge if he ever fights me…_

Hinata then turned her thoughts onto images of close-quarters combat with Naruto, but her train of thought was swiftly derailed when he spoke again.

"Wow," said Naruto, "I talked a whole lot there. You're a really good listener, Hinata."

"Th-thankyou," she managed to respond.

Just as he was about to call for his seventh bowl, Naruto was called out by Teuchi, who came from out the back to see him.

"Hey, Naruto!" he said.

"Hi, Teuchi," said Naruto. "This is Hinata; Hinata, Teuchi owns Ichiraku."

"Y-your ramen is very nice, Teuchi-san," said Hinata politely.

"Thankyou, Hinata," said Teuchi. "Naruto, I'd like to give you something today."

Naruto stopped eating.

"Huh?" he asked. "What?"

"Well," said Teuchi, sitting next to the boy, "you're getting older now, Naruto. You're a genin, so you'll start getting paid for your work, but a lot of that will go into items and books for your training, and the stipend you get from the Hokage tends to go towards food. Am I right?"

"Mm-hm," Naruto nodded.

Hinata suddenly realised why so many of Naruto's books were second-hand. As a child with no family, he'd have to live on the welfare money the Hokage's office gave him. There were probably not a great deal of impoverished ninja so she doubted that the stipend was too low, but considering how badly most people treated Naruto, she wouldn't be surprised if it were hard for him to buy the right equipment.

"Ayame and I both want you to have a…well-rounded life," he said. "We want you to have hobbies, time alone and with friends, things that aren't only about being a great ninja. But, you need money for most things like that."

"Teuchi," protested Naruto, "It's nice of you to say that, but I really can't accept you giving me money. I wanna make my own way to the top."

"We know," said Ayame. "So we're not giving you money. We're giving you stocks."

Naruto looked confused.

"…why would I need socks?" he asked.

"_Stocks_," Ayame said, while Hinata covered her mouth and giggled. "You might not know, but Ichiraku's part of a group of restaurants all over the Land of Fire. We're sort of a company."

"And if you own stocks in our company," said Teuchi, "you can sell them if they're worth more later, so you'll get money from that. It's our gift to you."

Naruto frowned.

"I'm not sure that this isn't some kinda sneaky way to teach me math," he said cautiously.

"You don't have to learn math," said Teuchi. "Just tell us when you want to sell your stocks, and we'll do that for you."

Slowly, Naruto nodded.

"Alright," he said, a smile encroaching on his wary face. "Thanks, Teuchi. And thanks for the ramen, Ayame."

Both smiled warmly. He reached for his wallet, but Teuchi shook his head.

"Those can be on the house for tonight," he said. "After all, it's not every day a young boy catches a criminal ninja, hm?"

Naruto grunted in conformation, and he and Hinata stood up, leaving Teuchi and Ayame behind.

Walking through the night in contented silence, Hinata looked up at the clear sky and mentally thanked whatever star had brought her that night. Then, naturally, Naruto broke the silence.

"You know," said Naruto, "when I was there in the forest, hiding from Mizuki…for a second I _really_ thought I was completely alone. Stupid, huh?"

"Y-you were scared," said Hinata. "It's just…something that happens."

Naruto nodded sagely, then stopped walking completely. Stopping with him, Hinata asked what was wrong.

"I told you about the Nine-Tailed Fox, didn't I?" he said, eyes widened.

"Mm-hm," she said.

Naruto cringed. _I can't believe it!_ He had been so caught up in telling his story (rather well, he thought) that he hadn't even thought to keep the fact that he had the Nine-Tailed Fox sealed inside him a secret! Now Hinata, and…Teuchi! Teuchi and probably Ayame both knew! This was a disaster. He didn't mean to let anyone else know…unless they already did!

"Argh, no!" he said out loud.

Seemingly reading his mind, Hinata said:

"I w-won't tell anyone."

He looked back to her.

"Really?"

She nodded very sharply, absolutely certain. His questing blue eyes stayed fixed upon her for a whole minute, his normally kind gaze now one of piercing concern. Then visibly relaxing, he returned to the perpetually happy-go-lucky boy she'd always known.

"Okay," he said.

Together, the young ninja walked home.

* * *

The Sasuke Law.

As Shino Aburame knew, there were multiple natural laws of the universe. The law of gravity, for example. Two objects exert a force on each other equal to the mass of both divided by the square of the distance between them, multiplied by the gravitational constant. The law of attraction between charged particles was similar. Both were independently verified, consistent and empirically proven laws. (Of course, they weren't _quite_ perfect descriptors of reality, but they were convenient enough lies that Shino was happy to use them.)

The Sasuke Law, on the other hand, was not. It did not appear in any of Shino's textbooks, of which he had read many. Bringing it up in conversation would only cause blank stares among, say, Ino Yamanaka. Even Shikamaru Nara, the only boy in the class Shino could conclusively say was smarter than him (although he was so lazy that Shino still had the academic advantage), would only respond with a look of bored confusion. It had never been independently verified or empirically proven.

But Shino Aburame was convinced it affected everything, all the same.

The Law was quite simple. Basically, every action that a person could do was ranked on a scale of ease. Persuading Naruto Uzumaki to eat, talk about or doodle little pictures in his notebook of ramen was on the 'easy' end of the scale. Understanding one of Iruka-sensei's lectures was about mid-range. Successfully carrying a conversation with another person without accidentally saying something that made them slowly inch away from you was on the 'exceptionally difficult' end. Thus, using this scale, one could map how hard any series of tasks could be, as if difficulty of an action was like mass, or magnetism, or topography. A 'difficulty field', if you will.

The Law was that no matter what the task was, Sasuke Uchiha's difficulty field was _always_ flat.

Holding his teeth firmly together and yet still grinding them a little, Shino Aburame stared down at the paper that he had received. It was a single test that would define his future career as a ninja, and he had passed admirably. Ninety-eight percent.

Nighty-eight percent was not enough for Shino. 'Admirably' was as good as failure in his eyes; he might as well have simply slept through the test.

How could he have received only ninety-eight percent? Hadn't he spent hour after hour reading through dozens of textbooks every night? Didn't he know the entire chakra pathway system; its locations, its names, its importance in combat and medicine as well as its uses outside those two areas? Hadn't his taijutsu forms been flawless, **exactly** the same as the ones in _Taijutsu For Genin And Beyond_?

This was unacceptable. He'd barely been able to meet the basic academic standard set down by his parents; what was he going to say to them? That ninety-eight percent was enough to become a genin, so what did it matter? It was a terrible start to his career as a ninja, and it was worst because he knew for _certain_ that Sasuke Uchiha had passed at ninety-nine point nine percent, the highest possible mark in the exam. There went the Sasuke Law again.

Actually, considering the Law even further, the system of 'difficulty fields' was probably best described as analogous to mass. If Shino was, say, a small moon, then the test had been an asteroid – one easily outweighed the other, and so Shino had brought it into his orbit. Sasuke, on the other hand, was a black hole. This was for three reasons:

1. Black holes were so massful that everything else seemed nearly massless in comparison. _He_ was so difficult to beat at anything, everything else paled in significance.

2. He seemed to suck all the light out of the room.

3. Otherwise sensible (and difficult to beat) people revolved around him.

The third point was being illustrated right this very minute, as virtually every girl in the class bar Hinata Hyuga was beating Naruto Uzumaki to a pulp for accidentally kissing Sasuke. Shino had not paid much attention to the exact circumstances of the situation, but he did privately wonder _why_. It wasn't as if giving Naruto bruises all over was going to remove the kiss from existence. He supposed it might've been simply because the girls didn't like Naruto, but why harangue someone you don't like when you can just avoid them completely?

That Kiba Inuzuka boy, for example. Sitting up in the further-back rows, Kiba was grinning from ear to ear at the prospect of becoming a real ninja. Listening to him babbling on, Shino realised with confusion and then astonishment that Kiba was happy to have simply _passed_. Evidently his family had somewhat lesser academic standards than Shino's, because he claimed that his mother and sister had both bought him presents due to his success. He was probably lying, of course, but Shino shuddered to think of what kind of upbringing could reward a child for merely _passing_ a test. No, a merely adequate performance was never enough, and he wouldn't let such ideas ruin his grades. Carefully, he moved a little away from Kiba.

"So," Kiba said to Shikamaru, "What you get?"

Shikamaru slowly directed his attention to the dog-ninja as Shino made a heroic effort to not correct the boy's grammar.

"Sixty-seven," he said in his usual detached tone.

"Sixty-seven?!" said Kiba, shocked. "Damn! Wish I'd done so well. My mom might've gotten me _two_ presents. Then again, not much use for more old _practice_ kunai anymore, huh boy?"

He patted his dog Akamaru affectionately, who poked his owner's chin with his nose in response. Shino looked at the two, analysing them.

_Very simple_, he said. _A symbiosis of only two._

"Doesn't matter, anyway," said Kiba. "I passed. And I bet I'll be first here to make chunin, as well!"

_Confidence bred by ignorance,_ noted Shino.

"Chunin?" asked Shikamaru, incredulously. "Gimme a break. We're all twelve; there's no way any of us are gonna try out for chunin this year. Besides, don't you think the tests to become a chunin might be a little bit harder than the ones to become a genin here?"

Kiba waved a hand at this.

"Shikamaru, Shikamaru," he said. (He would have said it a third time, but that would have taken too long.) "Being a good ninja's not _all_ about passing tests. You need something other than just smarts."

"Like _what_, exactly?" asked Shikamaru.

Kiba sat back.

"I dunno," he said. "Luck. Skill."

Shikamaru rolled his eyes.

"I suppose the rest of it's concentrated power of will?"

Ignoring his bickering classmates, Shino returned to the important task of the moment: squad selections. Even if he wasn't the highest-scoring student in the class, he would definitely have ranked at least second or third. That meant that while he would not be in a squad with the dead-last (Naruto, he guessed accurately), he would probably be with someone of a high score, and someone of a fairly low score. This was meant to 'balance out' the squad, although Shino personally saw no great reason for this system. The incompetent shouldn't be made genin at all.

"Squad Eight," announced Iruka. "Hinata Hyuga. Kiba Inuzuka. Shino Aburame."

Although it was hidden from view by the darkly tinted glass, Shino's left eye twitched.

_Oh, __**perfect**_, thought Shino.

With the squads announced, the class broke for lunch. Kiba dashed out almost immediately with Akamaru, while Sasuke Uchiha followed not long behind. Sakura Haruno left to find him almost immediately, an event that triggered Ino's first of many attempts that day to run off to find Sasuke first. She was only stopped by the presence of Iruka, who gently insisted that she at least familiarise herself with her teammates.

Hanging around at the back of the class, Hinata hoped against hope that this time, Naruto would notice her. Sitting alone and in the middle row, there was no Sakura to distract him now. If she stood up, maybe she could go and see him before he left.

Swallowing nervously, Hinata stood from her chair. Yes, today was the day that she would talk to Naruto again, and make real friends with him. Last night was a very lucky thing to have happened to her, but she couldn't depend on luck if she wanted Naruto to know about her feelings. Standing up from her desk and pushing her chair out, Hinata took the vital first step. Breathing carefully, she took another, and another, making her way through to the aisle.

_I can speak to him...I can speak to him...I can speak to him without blushing and looking down..._

Breathing in most at the last second, she began to take one more step when Shino Aburame stepped into her view.

_Argh!_

Silence followed.

"Hello," said Shino, remembering the correct word for greeting people this time.

"H-hello," Hinata responded.

More silence followed, as Naruto stared wistfully out the window. Hinata looked intently at him, and willed Shino to let her pass with all her heart, because she wasn't brave enough to tell him to get out of the way with her mouth.

_This conversation is going well_, thought Shino.

_MOVEMOVEMOVEMOVEMOVEMOVEMOVE!_

A smile crossed Naruto's face, and he stood up.

_NO! NOT __**YOU!**__ STAY!_

In her mind, Hinata shouted herself hoarse as Naruto walked away, but her mouth could only manage a small "uh...".

Shino felt the deep, unsettling feeling that he usually had whenever a conversation went wrong. Examining his place in the now mostly-empty classroom, as well as Hinata's, he looked to the door that Naruto had retreated through, then to the sad-looking girl in front of him, then the door again.

She was not an average girl. She was apparently not affected by the Sasuke Law, for one thing. For another, she was smart – the second smartest girl in the class, he knew from the test rankings.

_The __**second**__ smartest_...

It suddenly occurred to Shino that maybe Hinata was not unlike him. Always quiet unless spoken to, academically brilliant, but always beaten by one person - whichever girl received the highest marks. He wondered what exactly she wanted to speak to Naruto Uzumaki of all people for, but the sudden flash of realisation in Shino's mind was a welcome development. Maybe the conversation could be salvaged.

"Your written test score was impressive," said Shino.

The strange, pale boy's statement intrigued Hinata. The actual words weren't all that surprising, although it was nice to be reminded of her success. It was the tone. He had not said it jealously, but it had not been a compliment either. It was more of a statement of fact, no different to him informing her that her hair was short.

"T-thankyou, Shino," said Hinata. "P-perhaps we should...find Kiba?"

As the two walked out of the Academy side-by-side, it occurred to Hinata that she really should have been more angry with him. He had blocked off her access to Naruto when she was so close to speaking with him again, and hadn't even apologised! But she couldn't really think of a way to tell him off without starting on the wrong foot, and as he thoughtfully stared at the ground, she remembered how little he had spoken to anyone in the whole six years they'd been in the same class. Perhaps he simply wasn't very good at talking to other people, as opposed to ants.

The two found Kiba playing with Akamaru on the grass, both boy and dog greeting them cheerfully. Sitting in the shade of a tree, Hinata and Kiba ate their lunch in relative silence. Shino politely refused, saying that he wasn't hungry, although he disappeared for about five minutes for no apparent reason.

The silence among them was broken by the sudden appearance of Naruto. Sneaking past them with a devious smile on his face, the road-cone-coloured ninja had only passed out of sight for a few moments when Kiba asked the world in general:

"What do you think he's up to?"

Hinata was relieved to hear that Kiba's voice seemed to hold no hatred for Naruto. Instead there was amusement, condescension, and maybe even a hint of bitterness – but she wasn't sure. Mulling this over, she suggested:

"M-maybe he's planning a practical joke again."

Kiba leaned back as Akamaru mooched on the side of his face, and commented:

"He smells weird."

Shino raised an eyebrow as Hinata tried to keep her indignant rage internalised.

_Naruto smells perfectly normal! No…he smells __**perfect**__…_

Kiba continued:

"Not quite…_bad_. Sure, he could shower more, but it's not like he smells terrible. He smells like…power."

Shino raised the other eyebrow at him.

"Seriously! Akamaru can tell. Naruto smells like he's got more chakra than the rest of the class combined."

Akamaru jumped onto Kiba's lap as he said, with a touch of the theatrical:

"Maybe the rest of the village."

_So maybe other people __**do**__ know he has the Nine-Tailed Fox sealed within him_, Hinata thought. _But then again, it's probably best I don't mention it until somebody else does._

Shino, out of eyebrows to raise, was forced to speak.

"Unlikely," he said. "If Naruto were so powerful, surely he would've used all that chakra before. He has certainly been angered enough to do lasting damage on previous occasions, yet he has been a consistent dead-last in every class."

This was not quite true, strictly speaking. While 'sharp as a bowling ball' would be an unkind yet accurate descriptor of Naruto's mental prowess (although the scarcity of bowling balls in Konoha would make it an unusual phrase to use), he was actually semi-capable at taijutsu, and thanks to his frequent travels across Konoha he was excellent at chakra-jumping, the art of leaping huge distances in a single bound. As Iruka had always thought, there was a lot of raw strength and energy in the bright orange boy's stocky frame. The trick was getting him to use it _effectively_.

"I guess," said Kiba. "But Shikamaru's always getting low scores, and he's the smartest guy I know…damn. Poor bastard had to be in a team with Ino. Sure glad I didn't end up in her group."

Neither Shino nor Hinata responded, both instead staring into space. This continued for a full minute until Kiba stood up, Akamaru climbing up onto his shoulder in the process. He angrily said:

"Perfect. Two brilliant conversationalists for squadmates. We'll talk in a secret code of blushing and eyebrow-raising."

Neither responded to this, although Hinata looked a little more uncomfortable. Kiba threw up his hands.

"Oh, come _on_! We're never gonna be an interesting team if I'm talkin' to myself all the time! Hinata, we've been discussing Naruto for a full three minutes and you haven't got _anything_ to say to defend him?"

For the briefest of seconds, Kiba thought he'd succeeded in goading Hinata into speaking – but instead, she just looked down again, her pupilless eyes fixed on the ground. The boy realised that this was a step in the wrong direction, and sat down next to her.

He then said, quite softly:

"I'm sorry, Hinata. But…uh…you gotta realise…most of us _know_."

_Know what?_ thought Shino.

Hinata saddened further. _So I'm that obvious…_

"Look, it's…we're…uh, not, like, making fun of you for it. We're…"

He looked to Shino for hints; Shino remained cautiously impassive in response.

"…well, _I'm_ happy about it. Far as I'm concerned, any girl _not_ squeeing over Sasuke's a victory for good taste."

Hinata laughed at this, which lead Kiba to chuckle in response. He looked to Shino, who did not laugh along; he instead stood straight as ever and remained very still.

_That guy is really uptight_, he thought. _Still...got Hinata to laugh, at least._

_So __**that**__ is why she wanted to speak to Naruto..._his eyes narrowed in thought. _Curious._

"Where did you learn the word 'conversationalist'?" Shino asked.

"Vocabulary calendar," Kiba answered matter-of-factly, entirely unoffended. "My mom always tells me to learn to talk better, but I only got up to March fourth on it when Akamaru chewed it up. If you guys ever happen to end up at my house, put your shoes up on the _top_ shelf if you want 'em to survive the visit intact."

He looked furtively at both of his squadmates, as if it were a half-disguised invitation.

Hinata then spoke.

"Does it seem late?"

Kiba frowned in confusion.

"Huh?"

Hinata, straining against her desire to simply not speak, repeated:

"If it's not too early, then maybe we should f-find our sensei? Iruka-sensei didn't direct us to her, and we've been here a long time."

"That is a good point," said Shino. "We should probably search for her before much more of the day is wasted."

Kiba levelled his doglike eyes at Shino in suspicion.

'_Wasted'?_ he thought. _Oh yeah, go on. Stare back at me like you got no idea I heard your little crack at Hinata and me. You think you're so cool, Aburame, but __**I'll**__ show you. You wait and see._

_I wonder what Kiba is looking at me for,_ thought Shino.

Standing up, Kiba and Hinata went back to the courtyard outside the academy with Shino. Reaching a shady tree, they found three of their classmates – Shikamaru, Ino and Choji. Up in the classroom itself, Shino could see Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura waiting for their sensei.

"Hey guys," greeted Choji.

"Hey," replied Kiba, and Shino and Hinata nodded slightly to confirm their presence.

There were few class members who genuinely didn't like Choji; Ino Yamanaka was one of them. Trying not to bring up her own lunch as the portly boy continued on with his, Ino wondered in her head why anyone would let themselves go as far as an Akimichi could. She'd seen them enter her family's flower shop, and it wasn't just her…ugh…_squadmate_ that was a little on the heavy side.

_Lucky I have naturally skinny genes_, she thought, although she was prone to spontaneously dieting. Turning her attentions away to less weighty matters, she focused on the three members of Squad Eight.

Shino was a difficult one to read. Dressed in the same light grey jacket that he always wore and wearing the same dark, reflective glasses, Shino was a fly's wing away from exceptionally creepy. Although Shino was never intentionally mean, the way he talked was so blunt, precise and enunciated Ino sometimes wondered if he was even human at all. He had never shown any particular interest in other people, not even as friends; he instead preferred to watch ants making their hills or collecting food from him. She hoped that she would never have to mind-control him, because she figured his mind would be a quite scary place.

Kiba, on the other hand, was like a drawing in crayons. Kiba lived for two things – playing with Akamaru and fighting, which had overlapped more and more as the years rolled on. Probably the dumbest boy in the class apart from the obvious road-cone-coloured dead-last, he always wore a distinctly unfashionable fur hoodie that Akamaru would nestle in. Watching him rub his nose on Kiba's hair, Ino had to admit that Akamaru was a cute dog, but there was no way she'd ever try to pet him. She knew she'd never get the smell of either he or his owner off. As for people, Kiba tended to hang out with Shikamaru and Choji more than anyone else. He had once been friends with Naruto – possibly the inept student's _only_ friend – but evidently something had gotten between them, because now Kiba's best friend was Akamaru, and Naruto's best friend was…himself.

Hinata, on the other hand, was the hardest of all for Ino to get a fix on. If Ino were a member of a rich and influential clan…wait, she already was. But if she were a member of the _richest_ and _most_ influential clan, as Hinata was, she certainly wouldn't be so modest. Always mumbling and averting her eyes, Hinata consistently wore a thick little jacket and kept very quiet – definitely not Ino's style. More importantly, Ino certainly wouldn't be mooning over a scruffy street-rat whose idea of subtlety was bright orange and yet couldn't notice Hinata's love for him if it were stapled to his face. (Even _if_ it were so arranged that the part that faced his eyes was the part that said "HINATA LIKES YOU".) Then again, having one less girl in the ongoing competition for Sasuke Uchiha's heart was a welcome thing, and Hinata was sometimes so quiet and so nice Ino sort of wanted to give her a hug and maybe some chocolate.

Shikamaru inclined his head slightly to look at Squad 8, and spoke up.

"Thought you'd've left by now," he drawled.

"U-um…" began Hinata.

Shikamaru did not roll his eyes or mock Hinata as he once had. Ever since that day they had fought, so long ago now, he'd reigned in his comments around the quiet girl, partly to avoid hurting her feelings and partly to escape a potential beating. Hinata may have been shy and kind, but she was also the highest-ranked girl in taijutsu class, and he was still the worst boy at it.

"We are looking for our sensei," explained Shino. "She has not met us at the allocated time."

"Same here," shrugged Shikamaru, leaning back as he always did.

"So," he said, "Naruto and Sasuke on the same squad. That's gotta suck."

"For which one?" asked Kiba.

"Either," noted Shikamaru.

"Hey!" protested Ino. "Don't talk about my Sasuke like that! He's the most talented ninja in any class. He'll be the only reason that team gets anywhere."

Hinata privately wondered how Ino could still entertain hopes of making Sasuke her boyfriend when he had rejected every offer of love that had ever come his way (which he'd been receiving for a good five years now), and concluded that it wasn't just boys that were exceptionally bull-headed.

"He's good," admitted Shikamaru, "but only at school stuff. He'd really suck as a squadmate. Like, he has _never_ hung out with me and Choji, or anyone else to my knowledge, unless he absolutely had to."

"Well maybe if you weren't so mean to-"

"Mean?" asked Shikamaru. "We've always been the ones asking him! Hell, we even let Naruto tag along sometimes, and you know what _he's_ like."

Somehow slouching even further, he added:

"'Sides, I think he's a bit creepy, how he's always so focused and he barely ever says a word. Sasuke didn't get voted 'Most Likely To Snap One Day and Kill Everybody' for nothing."

Shino frowned.

"When was he voted this?" he asked.

Shikamaru sighed.

"Joke, Shino," he said. "I just made that up."

"Then it's not really a democratic approach," insisted Shino.

"His clan _died_, you know," pouted Ino. "You shouldn't say that about him."

"That was years ago," said Shikamaru. "More than enough time to get over something like that."

The group suddenly fell silent. Shikamaru realised that he'd done something wrong, but was unsure what exactly. Carefully looking around, he saw that neither Choji nor Ino looked particularly upset (although his friend had stopped putting chips in his mouth), and Shino remained as quietly stoic as ever. It was rather Hinata, and surprisingly Kiba, that looked melancholy.

"Yyyeah," he said lamely. Slouched on the ground, his formerly comfortable position had suddenly become very awkward.

Fortunately for all, a distraction finally came in the form of their senseis, a man and a woman. Both were fairly tall, but there their resemblances ended. The man dressed in a style not unlike Iruka's, following standard shinobi practices regarding uniform, but was more muscular and had impressive facial hair. The woman's clothes were mostly bandages, and she had dark, slightly curly hair and quite striking maroon eyes.

Stepping forward, the man spoke to all of them.

"I'm sorry for our lateness," he said.

"Thirty minutes? What, were you on a date?" asked Shikamaru.

The previous sad awkward silence was quickly replaced by a happier, more innocent awkward silence thanks to his comment. Neither Shino nor Shikamaru's expressions changed, but Ino smiled knowingly, Hinata fidgeted nervously, and Choji rapidly returned to his chips. Kiba said nothing, but Akamaru nudged at his face in such a way that Kiba quickly knew both of the senseis were emitting very _particular_ pheromones. The frown that marred his face slowly melted away, and he instead grinned into his jacket as the male sensei spoke.

"Uh, we'll take it from here," the shinobi said, even though there was nobody to really take things from. "Ino, Shikamaru, Choji…"

A smile passed over his face as the three followed him away to another part of the courtyard.

The raven-haired kunoichi stepped forward, her maroon eyes flicking from Shino to Kiba, then finally resting on Hinata, who politely returned the gesture by quietly looking lower than her gaze.

"Good afternoon. I'm Kurenai Yuhi, and I'll be your squad leader. I know all your names, but I'd like you to tell me them again so we can be sure."

She smiled, and Hinata immediately felt heartened. She had never met the jonin before, but she was sure that the kunoichi would be kind.

Kiba briefly waited, then said:

"I'm Kiba of the Inuzuka clan. This is my dog, Akamaru."

Akamaru yipped in greeting; Kurenai nodded to the dog.

Shino then spoke.

"I am Shino Aburame. Kurenai-sensei, have you heard of my clan's particular skill?"

Kurenai began to respond, but Shino continued speaking, something that both Hinata and Kiba winced slightly at.

"If you have, then you will also know that it might have psychological effects on Kiba and Hinata if I use it. Knowing this, would you consider it best for me to avoid using this skill at all costs?"

Kurenai considered this.

"I am placing this at your discretion, Shino, although you should probably know that Hinata _could_ discover this skill for herself."

Shino looked subtly uncomfortable.

_Me? Why could only I and not Kiba work out what Shino's skill is? _thought Hinata. _I don't know much about the Aburame clan…something related to bugs? But they're very mysterious. Hmm, it's kind of exciting having teammates I don't know much about! B-but I shouldn't try to find out Shino's secret skill. Even if it is very interesting_.

Kurenai turned to Hinata.

"I'm sorry, Hinata, I've deprived you of your introducing yourself."

"Th-thankyou, Kurenai-sensei."

Kurenai frowned.

_I didn't think Hiashi was being fair on her when he said she was useless_, she thought, considering the lord's words, _but she __**is**__ pretty shy._

"I'd…still like it if you did introduce yourself, Hinata."

"Sorry, Kurenai-sensei. My name is Hinata Hyuga."

"And?"

Hinata looked confused.

"And I don't have any other names?"

Kurenai laughed.

"No, Hinata, _your_ special skill. The skill of your family."

"Oh!" Hinata realised. "The Byakugan."

Kurenai nodded. Kiba, suddenly also looking as uncomfortable as Shino, spoke again.

"Uh, Kurenai-sensei, maybe we should all agree to, uh, agree to not, um…use our skills on…each other?"

Hinata blinked in confusion. _What could he mean? I don't see how the Byakugan could frighten Kiba – it's not even an offensive technique by itself. It's only for seeing things from afar and through thi-_

…_**through**__ things._

Kiba rubbed the back of his neck in awkwardness, and Hinata blushed down at the ground. Shino, on the other hand, looked more concerned than embarrassed.

"Put it this way, Kiba," remarked Kurenai. "We'll try to keep from using our particular special skills unless it's a matter of life or death. Is everyone fine with that?"

All three genin nodded.

"Excellent," said Kurenai. "We'll head to the training ground."

* * *

So, Kurenai has met the squad! ("Bawnk!" shouts Kiba, "I am zeh spy" says Shino, "Mwfh mfh fh fh" says Hinata.) I think this is a better chapter length than the last chapter's; it fits the right amount of stuff in without being too short. Or maybe not, please tell me what you think!

Note: Thanks to the Concept making the wind blow so Naruto got up earlier, Hinata spent that evening eating ramen with Naruto rather than at the Hyuga compound. So here, Hiashi would still have told Kurenai why he thinks Hinata's not really worth that much, but Hinata herself would not have been listening outside (as she was eating ramen with Naruto instead).

Edit: Thanks so much for reading (possibly again)! I swear, next chapter'll be up real soon, and this time I'll take a bit more time to edit it. But I'm glad I went back and George Lucas'd this one, because I think it's way better now. Thanks again!

-MA


	4. Sensei's Test

Hey there! I did intend to update much earlier this week, but I got lost on the road of life instead. Hey, I wonder if Kakashi's always late because he's writing fanfic? Anyway, I have decided that since I can't keep to a one-week update schedule, I'll switch to a bi-weekly one. (That's once every fortnight, not twice a week.)

Anyway, here is the fourth chapter of _The Sun Kunoichi_!

* * *

_Chapter Four: Sensei's Test_

Kurenai carefully observed the three genin sitting before her on the grass. A few kilometres from the centre of Konoha, they were in front of a training ground that Kurenai had booked for their first day. All three looked tired; she had encouraged them to reach the training ground as quickly as possible as a sort of warm-up exercise.

In retrospect, that may have not been the best of ideas. The Aburame boy, Shino, was making a brave face of not being tired by the journey from the academy, but he was obviously stifling coughs and his legs were shaking. Hinata's breathing was not as laboured, but she was propped up on her hand for support as she breathed in and out a little quicker than normal, her eyes looking too weary for Kurenai's liking. Kiba, on the other hand, seemed to have as much energy as ever, sitting upright with Akamaru sitting on his head. Kurenai wasn't sure, but she suspected Akamaru's tail was wagging.

"Okay." she said, "That was alright for a first time, but we'll need to move faster next time."

_F-faster?_ thought Hinata.

Hinata thoughtfully rubbed her feet through her sandals as she tensed her dully aching legs. After Kurenai had met the team, she had lead them to this forest by chakra-jumping through– or, more accurately, over – Konoha. While Kiba had been lightning-fast and Shino had performed admirably, Hinata had sadly been far behind the rest of the group for the most part. Chakra-jumping depended on the direction of chakra to the feet, which Hinata had never been particularly good at despite years of practice; the journey had been a hard one for her. Her teammates, on the other hand, seemed just fine at it. If she had had more strength Hinata would have apologised to them for holding them up, but at this point she was content to lie on the grass and listen to her sensei.

Kurenai addressed the three.

"You comprise Squad Eight, the squad dedicated to tracking and reconnaissance. The foundation of a good recon squad is what, Kiba?

Kiba concentrated.

"Uhh…" he said.

Kurenai's gaze shifted from Kiba to Shino and back again. Kiba seemed to have no idea of the answer despite the hints she'd dropped just before asking the question, while Shino suddenly looked much more alert, sitting up as straight as Kiba and perhaps muttering to himself under his jacket.

_Just like the report said,_ she thought.

"Kurenai-sensei…" Shino said.

"Yes, Shino?" she asked, while Kiba obviously thought harder.

"It is speed and endurance," Shino declared.

"Oh, yeah!" said Kiba, nodding. "Yep, that's what I was gonna say."

_When?_ thought Shino, giving his squadmate a contemptuous look.

Kurenai nodded as she thought: _Textbook answer - literally_. _Looks like I did end up with the bookworm after all._

_Then again, if __**I**__ remember that was from a textbook…_

"The function of a recon team is to enter enemy territory, find out our required information, then return to safety. A recon team needs to be fast so it can complete its assigned missions quickly, before the enemy discovers its presence. Endurance is important because…Hinata?"

Hinata looked up and said:

"B-because we need to be fast all the time?"

Kurenai nodded at this.

"That's right," she said. "Not only do we need to be fast, we need to be fast for long periods of time. You won't do any long spying missions for a few years yet, but those require a lot of patience and obversation."

_Patience and obversation?_ thought Kiba. _Great. _

Taking her own advice, Kurenai noted that Shino and Hinata seemed more energetic than before, their breathing normal. Kiba, on the other hand, was scowling, presumably because his teammates had both answered questions correctly while he'd said nothing important. Fidgeting with the cord of his jacket, he spoke again.

"So what's our test?" asked Kiba. "I mean, this forest's a training ground, right?"

_Hasn't called me 'Kurenai-sensei' or even 'sensei'_, Kurenai thought. _Iruka did say he could be troublesome…_

…'_troublesome?' What am I, a Nara?_

Suppressing a smile, Kurenai asked:

"None of you have entered this forest before, have you?"

All three shook their heads.

"They say it's dangerous," said Hinata.

"It's not," said Kurenai. "Well, not intentionally. This is one of the lower-level training zones; it's for genin only. We'll start by-"

"Genin only? Weak," said Kiba dismissively. "We can do up to Chunin level. This is kid's stuff!"

_What? Chunin level?_ thought Hinata. _Could…is Kiba serious?_

_Hinata appears concerned_, thought Shino. If she taking the dog-nin's wild claims seriously, then she was perhaps not as astute a learner as he'd previously thought – everybody knew Kiba was of below-average intelligence. Alternately, it was possible that she was not concentrating on the matter at hand it all. She could have been considering Naruto's wellbeing instead, 'daydreaming' if you will.

He'd been wondering about that ever since Kiba had mentioned it earlier that day. _Hinata_ had a crush on _Naruto_? Really, when did that happen? As he recalled, they'd been pretty distant for most of the time he'd known them, and he'd known them (or at least known _of_ them) since he was six years old. Shino couldn't pretend he knew how crushes worked, but it all sounded a bit strange to him.

Kiba grinned at his declaration.

_I'm gonna kick ass!_

Kurenai tried very hard not to sigh out loud.

_Just like the report,_ she thought. _I didn't want to be stereotypical and say an Inuzuka'd be like this, but..._

Shino pushed his glasses up from the bridge, and said:

"You might be a little more conservative in your estimates of our skills."

The grin disappearing from his face, Kiba cast his glare at Shino.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he said.

"You passed the genin exams, but only by a narrow margin," said Shino in an even tone. "It is unrealistic to think you can perform at such a high level."

"Hey!" shouted Kiba. "You wanna prove who's the better genin?"

"I believe the exams already have," Shino stated.

Kiba stood up, fists bunched up, but Hinata quickly said:

"P-please, Kiba, don't fight! That's not what we're h-here for."

The standing dog ninja looked to Hinata. It figured that she'd be the one stepping in between he and Shino. Half mad at her but also half grateful, he unclenched his fists and sat down. He wouldn't have been nearly as mad if Shino hadn't been so stoic, so _calculated_ about how he talked to Kiba. Sure he hadn't gotten as high marks as Shikamaru, but he'd still passed, and dammit, that made him just as good a genin as any other.

Kurenai looked on approvingly at Hinata. The girl was shy, but she had successfully defused the first of what were probably to be many fights between Shino and Kiba. Already starting to understand why Iruka had suggested these particular genin for her, she spoke again.

"Alright," she said. "You wanna prove yourself?"

Kiba enthusiastically nodded, and the other two looked more focused.

"There is a scroll in the training zone behind me," she said. "Whoever of you three touches it first leads the team."

Kiba frowned again.

"Uh...don't _you_ lead the team?"

"Yes," said Kurenai. "And I'll continue to do so, provided I touch the scroll first."

Shino studied the kunoichi through his dark glasses.

_Willing to risk potential loss of leadership? Unlikely. Purely a test._

Kurenai looked to Shino.

"Shino? You don't think so?"

Shino found himself shaking his head, and quickly stopped, cursing himself for letting his thoughts show so obviously.

"When do we begin, Kurenai-sensei?" he asked.

Kurenai stepped back, allowing all three genin a clear jump to the forest.

"Go," she said.

Kiba leapt to his feet and immediately ran off into the forest, the gate swinging open at his touch. Shino quietly and determinedly stood up and quickly walked to the gate, while Hinata sat up.

"Mmph," she said, collecting her thoughts.

"Hinata," said Kurenai, and the girl jumped a little.

_S-sensei! I should go quickly. I shouldn't act like I'm lazy or she'll think badly of me._

Hinata looked somewhat nervous and scared to Kurenai. She began to wonder if Hinata was cut out for the job of a ninja, then she remembered the day she'd visited the Hyuga compound, and the blank yet harsh look on the face of Hiashi as he paid almost no attention to Kurenai's questions about Hinata.

_I'm not going to let her prove him right,_ she determined, and she spoke again:

"Don't you want to find the scroll before Shino or Kiba?"

Hinata felt that she should say yes (enthusiasm was one thing that teachers seemed to approve of immensely), but she could only mumble in response:

"N-no…I don't really want to lead the team."

Kurenai didn't criticise Hinata for not getting the point of the exercise, and instead asked:

"Why not?"

This question brought images to Hinata. Images of a mother that she barely remembered, ones that she wasn't sure were even real, saying her name softly. Images of her father trying to train her to be a great leader…then ones of the day she'd been told that she was no longer to be the ruler of the Hyuga clan. It hadn't been her father who'd told her, but she didn't remember the words of the person who did at the time. She only remembered images, the faces of Hanabi and Hiashi that had been etched onto her mind and coloured by her crying afterwards.

"I…"

Hinata faltered to admit what she was certain everybody already knew. Before her, her sensei gave a small smile, and nodded encouragingly, slowly.

"…I don't think I'm strong enough."

The secret out, she hunched over, clutching her legs.

"No," said Kurenai.

_No?_ wondered Hinata. _'No' what?_

"Your father doesn't think you're strong enough," her teacher explained.

Hinata breathed out a gasp. She had long believed this, but conformation of her father's disappointment was still confronting.

"What I mean is, your father doesn't _think_ you're strong enough."

_What?_

"I don't understand," Hinata admitted.

"You _might_ be weak," said Kurenai. "But if you were, why would you be one of the highest ranked students in your class academically? Why would you be the best girl in your year level at taijutsu?"

"But I was one of the lowest in the taijutsu part of exam," protested Hinata.

Kurenai shook her head.

"Doesn't matter. Apart from the final exam, you were consistently the best at taijutsu."

"O-only the best girl," said Hinata.

"Hinata, _**never**_ let yourself think you're not as good just because you're a girl."

Kurenai had suddenly become very forceful, and Hinata felt herself compelled to nod sharply. Relaxing again, Kurenai continued:

"Besides, if you rank the boys and girls together, you're actually third best out of the class."

Hinata looked confused.

"What I'm saying," said Kurenai clearly, "is that your father is wrong about you. I've got no idea why he thinks you're weak, but he's wrong about that."

_And virtually everything else,_ she mentally added.

Kurenai watched Hinata carefully as the conflicted girl sat in thought. She hoped she hadn't seriously upset Hinata's worldview – obedience to the father was particularly important in big old-fashioned clans, and you didn't get clans much bigger or older-fashioned than the Hyuga. Still, if it helped her to finally break free of the shadow of Hiashi…

Hinata stood.

"Thankyou, Kurenai-sensei," she said.

Here the wind changed again. Hinata resisted the urge to clutch her arms against the cold as she once had, instead sticking her hands in her pockets to warm them. The wind was blowing at her back, towards the forest. Was it a sign?

Feeling the warmth of her chakra spread up to her head, Hinata made a hand sign and directed the chakra forward, into her eyes.

"_Byakugan_," she said, and walked into the forest.

0000000000

Kiba leapt through the trees of the forest happily as his chakra rose and fell. Up and down his legs it went, coursing through his chakra network as he leapt and then fell again. It flew to his feet when he landed, then up to his legs when he jumped, then back down to his feet again. Unlike most other people he knew, Kiba was also quite happy to run on all fours. He guessed this was because of the Inuzuka clan's connection with dogs, but he'd never really looked into it. Some people still teased him because of how odd this looked, but he always casually responded with a quick retort if he could think of one or a pair of raised middle fingers if he couldn't.

There was one other boy who ran on all fours sometimes, but Kiba preferred not to think about him that much.

Kiba sniffed the air. Akamaru had been unable to find the scroll through its scent alone, but he could tell from the lingering scent of an unusual type of soap that Kurenai was still standing in front of the forest. He was wondering how exactly she'd be able to monitor them when a new smell, papery and thin, caught his attention.

Shino was standing below in a clearing, looking up at him blankly. Remembering the insults the Aburame had given him earlier, Kiba and Akamaru growled as one and threw a pair of shuriken at Shino as they leapt into the clearing.

He did not move as the shuriken flew towards him; he simply batted them away with his kunai casually, Kiba landing a few metres in front of him. The clearing was small, only six or so square metres in size, but it was not even ground. Gnarled and knotted tree roots erupted from the dirt across the forest floor, like an ancient, tanned scar.

Frowning at his squadmate's further success, Kiba reached for his kunai when Shino spoke to him.

"I request that you stop throwing weapons at me," said Shino.

Kiba kept a hand to his kunai's holster, but accepted Shino's idea and did not throw it. Hands in pockets, Shino said:

"We must speak."

"Yeah?" said Kiba, suspiciously. "What about?"

Shino stood up even straighter and frowned beneath his glasses. Try as he might, he couldn't fathom Kiba's responses to anything. The boy seemed to bristle whenever simple fact was stated, and Shino never shied from fact. It was thus not completely surprising that they would come into conflict. Shino did not desire this; unneccessary conflict was a waste of resources. All he needed to do was set the Inuzuka on the right path of reasonable deduction and not irrationally rushing into things.

This was, at least, what Shino told himself. But try as he might to ignore it, to quell his distaste for the Inuzuka under the guise of trying to be helpful, in truth he had no idea who Kiba was. He'd never expected to speak with the dog-focused boy, let alone be in a squad with him. Shino didn't understand Kiba at all, and both he and the questions that he raised in the Aburame's mind were just...

"_Infuriating_," he muttered under his breath.

Kiba did not hear this, but Akamaru's low growl next to him clued him in that whatever Shino had said, it wasn't complementary.

Breathing out, Shino concentrated on explaining the facts to Kiba, and made a note to use an uncomplicated vocabulary. After all, his dog had eaten his calendar.

_Why do I remember that?_ Shino thought to himself, although his confusion did not show on his face.

Kiba frowned. He was unused to long periods of silence that didn't involve eating or sleeping.

"Hello?" he asked the silent boy before him. "You in there?"

_In where?_ wondered Shino, but he brushed it off and finally spoke again.

"This test," he said, "is not real."

Kiba tilted his head to one side in confusion.

_What?_

"Is that, like, Aburame clan philosophy or something?"

Shino shook his head slightly, although this time he didn't notice as nobody brought it to his attention. Aburame clan philosophy, to the extent of Shino's reading of it, was mostly bug-focused. Here he was simply stating the truth.

"What I am saying is that there is no need for..."

Words failing him, Shino fell to gesturing with his hands to communicate. Well, it worked for ants, didn't it?

_...mindless heroics? Canine idiocy? Bushido?_

Kiba folded his arms.

"Oh, I get it," he said, annoyed.

_Finally_, thought Shino.

"You want the scroll, so you're trying to make me think it's all a joke!" said Kiba. "Well, forget it! _I'm_ gettin' that scroll, and there's no way you're gonna stop me!"

"It is a game," said Shino through tersely gritted teeth, "only a _game_. If you cannot realise that, you are even more of an idiot than I th-"

Shino's train of thought was knocked out of his mouth in a gust of air as Kiba's fist slammed into him, sending him stumbling. Head ringing and eyes unfocused, Shino grabbed a tree in surprise as Kiba stood before him, crouched for combat.

"P-pu...eh," said Shino, winded. "Punching me won't invalidate my argum-meh..."

His head hung and his body drooped. Surprising as it was, the fanged boy had one hell of a punch.

Kiba looked concerned, and stood up straighter, the wild look in his eyes less focused.

"You okay?" he asked, stepping forward.

_Now_, thought Shino, and he struck.

"Woah!"

Kiba leapt back from Shino's punch, wondering whether the glassed boy had been faking his weakened condition or whether this was a desperation move. The kicks that followed, straight and true, proved that it was probably fakery – Shino was fighting just fine. Now more relaxed, Kiba dropped his concern but not his guard, leaning back and loosening up.

Shino held still as Kiba wobbled. Staring carefully at the other boy to discern what he was doing, Shino felt the tremor of a thousand or so tiny intelligences within him yearning to be free. He firmly communicated 'NO' to them (the feeling, if not the actual word), and concentrated on his taijutsu.

Swiping forward, Shino's fist missed Kiba as the dog nin did a sort of cartwheel, sending a kick swinging towards Shino's head that Shino only narrowly dodged. Rolling away from a kick from Shino, Kiba tripped over a log, but he swung back up around a tree and kicked again. Shino dodged and began a flurry of strikes from his hands.

"Why are you fighting?" he asked.

Kiba leapt at Shino with both fists and responded:

"'Cos I feel like it?"

Kiba's punches swung narrowly past Shino's thin body, Akamaru clinging onto Kiba's head as the small dog was rocked by his master's erratic movements. Shino rapidly dodged from side to side, chakra coursing through his body as he stepped over branches carefully.

"But why fight when you could be capturing the scroll?" he asked, out of breath.

_Oh yeah!_ thought Kiba.

Seizing his chance, Shino hit Kiba in the mouth – a little harder than perhaps necessary, he later thought – and leapt off into the higher trees.

Swaggering even further as he reeled from the blow, Kiba glared at the retreating Shino, and leapt off after him. If he could follow Shino at a medium-range distance, the Aburame would lead him to the scroll, he knew it.

Shino leapt quickly from branch to branch, allowing the steady rhythm of the chakra moving through his feet to push him forward. He was tired, a lot more so than he should have been. It didn't make sense. If Kiba had only barely passed the genin exams, why was he so proficient at taijutsu? He would have had to have been exceptionally highly placed in taijutsu to make up for his obvious mental deficiencies. Then again, Naruto Uzumaki had apparently passed...

Considering this disturbing train of thought, Shino focused his gaze on the ground of the forest far below him, scouting for the scroll.

0000000000

Hinata leaned against a tree and panted for breath, her sides aching. Staring back at the path she'd taken, she guessed she'd alternated between running and walking for about a kilometre now. She had released the Byakugan some time ago. The three-hundred-and-sixty-degree vision aspect of her bloodline limit wasn't much use when the others were obviously far ahead of her (although Kurenai seemed to just be standing outside the training ground), and she was wary of using the 'see through everything' part because of the three's agreement to only use their techniques in extreme situations.

She was torn from her ponderings on what exactly Shino's special technique was when she entered a long coughing fit. When she recovered, she reluctantly admitted to herself that perhaps she'd been lax in her training up to this point. Good taijutsu student or not, she was still far behind the boys in terms of endurance, and as for speed…

_It would be much easier if I could chakra-jump_, she thought.

Staring down at her feet, Hinata tried to focus her chakra and then sent it downwards. Feeling the particular buzzing warmth of her chakra reach the soles of her feet, Hinata stalled. This was the easy part; the difficulty was persuading the chakra to flow back up to her legs. Hinata tried hard, even going so far as to make a hand sign, but the chakra stayed in her feet. This was why she could never get the hang of chakra-jumping; her chakra seemed to always reach her feet and stay there until she released it.

Feeling her chakra waver, she sadly released it and it disappated, resulting in her feet glowing a little.

Suddenly, a small object dropped onto her lap. Jumping in fright, as it might have been a wasp or something, Hinata was relieved to discover that it was simply a leaf that had fallen from the tree above. She picked it up and stared at it, feeling the veins inside. As the sunlight suddenly increased, Hinata held it up before her, now seeing the lines of the veins in the light.

Her eyes widened.

_Maybe…_

"_Byakugan_," she said again. This time not looking for the scroll, she instead stared down at her own body, her chakra network laid out in front of her. Watching her feet and legs, Hinata impelled her chakra down to her feet, and watched the vein-like network light up as the energy pooled at the soles.

Waiting for her command, the chakra swirled as she began to coax it, in her mind, to go up to her calves and thighs. It remained stubbornly motionless.

Cursing furiously yet tamely as ever, Hinata looked away from her feet for a few seconds then back at them, trying again to push the chakra up into her legs. Still nothing happened.

Trying to calm herself down, Hinata breathed in and out slowly. In…out…in…out…

...the chakra started moving.

Not getting her hopes up, Hinata breathed in a little, and the chakra went up to half her calves. Breathing out, it returned to the feet. In again, and it reached the knee; out again, to the feet. It went no further the next few times. Hinata began to think it was hopeless; surely Kiba and Shino would have reached the scroll by now.

Then she remembered Kurenai's words. For anyone to think so highly of _her_, the failure of the Hyuga clan…well, Naruto always congratulated her when she did well in class, but she had to admit Naruto often had no idea what he was talking about; he was probably just being nice. She looked down at her feet once more, then up at the sun.

She deactivated the Byakugan.

"_Hinata…"_

She looked up. A memory came to her, words whispered over a cradle in the darkness of night, in the a time when a child wavers between the real and the dreamworld.

"_You will guide the way, my little Hinata, but you will not walk it alone. There will always be a part of me that will live on in you, because within you is all the good that I have. You will be a light to others, and your name is the place of the sun."_

"Mother…"

Stretching out her arms beside her, Hinata stood up from the tree and became still. The chakra within her glowed in the light, and it rapidly spread up to her legs. She felt the warmth of the sunlight upon her, and said:

"…thankyou."

Standing up carefully, she breathed out once more and set her sights on a tree branch about ten metres ahead of her. After spending so long wondering about herself, she knew she probably wouldn't be able to get the scroll, but she certainly wasn't going to let Shino or Kiba leave her in the dust.

_Okay,_ she told herself. _Just jump to that branch…_

Hinata pushed off with her feet, and flew straight past the branch at a fantastic speed, climbing up further and further into the sky.

_What?_

Shooting into the air, Hinata wondered if perhaps too much chakra wasn't a good thing, and so was relieved when she started to fall back down to earth. Landing would be easy enough; just direct chakra back into the feet to absorb the impact…now!

Dropping onto a tree branch, the chakra disappated into the air as Hinata tried to regain balance.

_Alright,_ she thought. _Perhaps I should try a little less high this time._

She wondered if she could replicate the chakra again, or whether the first jump was a fluke. Standing carefully on the branch, she thought on the moment again, and felt a deep satisfied happiness at her success. The chakra reached her legs again.

Reducing it a little from last time, she leapt off. She didn't go quite so high this time, althoughs she noticed with satisfaction that her jump was higher and longer than either Kiba or Shino's had been. Shifting the chakra to her feet and landing on another branch, Hinata smiled as she jumped into the air. She could see why Naruto had been so joyous when they first met.

With a newfound sense of purpose, Hinata reactivated the Byakugan and leapt over the forest.

0000000000

Shino dropped to the ground in triumph. Right before him was the scroll.

Stepping forward cautiously, Shino quietly waved his left hand, and a small insect appeared on it. It was a drone, a particular kind of male capable of flight. Focusing on the insect's mind, Shino told it 'check', and it compliantly took wing, hovering over to the scroll and touching it lightly. The scroll did not explode, so either it was not an explosive, or it was an explosive that was not sensitive enough for a bug to set it off. Telling the drone to return, Shino had only just hidden it away when another person appeared from the high branches.

It was Hinata, somewhat muddier than last time Shino had seen her. There was also something else about her now, something different that went deeper than what Shino could see, a boost of power that he seemed to feel within himself despite there being no known reason for it. She was as timid as ever, but there was a little smile on her face, and her eyes seemed less afraid.

_Curious_, he thought.

"H-hello, Shino," she said, obviously a little disappointed but still mysteriously happy-sounding.

She looked to the scroll, and then to him.

"Have you touched it?" she asked.

"No," he replied, honestly.

"W-why not?"

Shino frowned at her question as well as her sudden shift in attitude. This was not like the Hinata he knew. Well, he hadn't really known Hinata for that long. In fact, he barely knew her at all. Was this _normal_? From Kiba's irrational outbursts to Hinata's oscillating from bright happiness to awkward shyness, Shino started to think he was the only normal one in his team. As such, he should have taken the scroll.

And yet he hesitated. Did he really want the responsibility of being the leader of such a bizarre group? Managing two very emotional people was not appealing to him, a man of sound reasoning.

_Wait, what am I thinking?_ Shino mentally slapped himself. _None of this is real! _

If Kurenai-sensei were serious about potentially giving up the leadership of the squad, although she obviously wasn't, she would be trying much harder to beat the three genin to it. Shino knew for a fact that Kurenai was not anywhere near the scroll at this point; she was most likely still standing outside the forest. Although this obviously raised the question of how she could monitor who touched the scroll first…

"I do not believe that this is a real test," he explained. "Touching the scroll will not grant me, or indeed any of us, leadership of the squad."

Hinata had to admit, he had a point.

"M-maybe it was all a way for us to show our skills," said Hinata.

She wondered if Kurenai had spoken to Kiba and Shino like she had to her, or whether she'd been the only one. She felt mixed about Shino's suggestion. On the one hand, she was a little disappointed to find out that there was no chance for her to be a leader of a squad. She then realised that she probably wouldn't do very well at it – only experienced chunin led squads. And yet, the desire for more people to think of her as strong, as Naruto and Kurenai did, made her all the more determined to rise to the challenge.

Kiba loudly interrupted both genin's trains of thought when he and Akamaru landed before them.

"Alright, bug-guy," he said, "let's-…"

At Akamaru's nudging, he turned to see Hinata.

"Oh, hey, Hinata!"

He grinned at her in confusion.

"How'd you get here so fast?"

"J-jumped," she replied.

"Oh," said Kiba.

Akamaru nudged him again, and he nodded. He had smelt a new scent about five minutes or so back, and he had wondered what it was exactly before putting it out of his mind. Seeing it turn out to be Hinata was…interesting. If he'd had to guess, he would've said it was Sakura or perhaps Ino that he'd smelt, although there was no sense in them being there. Girls' chakra smelt different to boys' – one reason why Naruto (ugh) had never caught him out with his Sexy Jutsu – and Hinata had always had a fairly low amount. Now, however, she seemed to have as much as Sakura or Ino, although it was steadily getting lower and lower, as evidenced by the scent of girl-chakra decreasing.

He then addressed Shino. "Got here earlier, huh?"

"The way you chakra-jump is inefficient," said Shino. "It is unusual to use all fours. Coupled with the fact that I left our confrontation earlier, that is probably why you have arrived last."

Kiba failed to think of a retort, and so fell to a one-handed plan B, Hinata gasping nervously and Shino not responding.

"Well, we are all present," said Shino, trying to ignore Kiba's hand gesture.

"Did either of you touch it?" asked Kiba.

"Neither Hinata nor I have touched the scroll," said Shino tersely. "_Because_ _it's not real_."

"Do you mean it's a genjutsu?"

Shino shook his head.

"How do you know?" asked Kiba.

"I simply do," said Shino evasively.

"Yeah, right," said Kiba. "I think you switched the real one. This doesn't smell right to be a real scroll."

"Are you saying I am an imposter?" asked Shino.

"No," replied Kiba. "You smell like Shino. But I am saying you're sneaky. Saying all that stuff about 'it's not real'? Clever."

"You are wrong," stated Shino, closing his eyes in frustration. "It is not a genuine test of leadership."

Kiba grunted in response. He took a step forward and crouched down in front of the scroll, catching the sudden whiff of a smell not unlike gunpowder.

"No!" said Shino and Hinata in unison, and Kiba touched it.

The ground beneath their feet immediately gave way and turned to mush, all three genin falling in up to their waists. The scroll itself floated above them, while Akamaru had evidently leapt to safety somewhere.

_I suppose he __**is**__ smarter than Kiba,_ thought Shino.

"Excellent work," he said, to which Kiba growled in response.

"K-Kurenai-sensei is here," said Hinata.

Both left their insults and looked up. Kurenai stood up above on a branch, holding the scroll. Kiba looked back down to the scroll on the ground, then back up.

"G-genjutsu?" asked Hinata.

"No," replied Kurenai. "that scroll is real, and I didn't use any genjutsu – I knew Shino would see through that."

Shino nodded, and Kiba glared.

"I used the Body Flicker Technique to appear far enough away for Kiba not to be able to smell me, and I knew Hinata wasn't using the Byakugan. Once I'd appeared, I ran to the scroll and took it before Kiba could. So I suppose I'm still squad leader."

"Don't count on it!"

_What?_ thought Hinata.

_What?_ thought Shino.

_Oh_, thought Kurenai, _that's inventive._

Kiba burst through the treeline towards Kurenai, kunai in-hand and shouting loudly.

"You watching, Shino?"

_Hm?_

Colliding with Kurenai, Kiba felt his kunai-hand miss the jonin as she grabbed hold of it, twisting it behind his back and pushing him against a tree.

"Clever work, Kiba," said Kurenai. "But remember, I've read files on you. I guessed the Kiba down there was the Man-Beast Clone when it didn't _say_ anything."

_Man-Beast Clone…_ thought Shino. _Of course! Akamaru isn't missing; he's Transformed into Kiba!_

As if to illustrate his point, the 'Kiba' trapped with Hinata and Shino suddenly became Akamaru again in a puff of smoke, the little dog clawing its way out of the Kiba-sized hole it'd been in.

Shino nodded to himself, feeling…respect? He could see through genjutsu, but couldn't detect the presence of objects under the Transformation Jutsu. Even so, Kiba must have replaced himself with Akamaru very, very quickly for Shino to miss it. He supposed he must have shut his eyes for more than a blink or something.

"Akamaru, dig Shino and Hinata out, will you?" asked Kiba.

Kurenai pressed his arm to his back further.

"I'll save you the trouble," she said, letting go of Kiba to perform a hand sign.

Hinata and Shino rose up from the ground until they reached the surface, where it became solid once more. Now both very dirty, they stood up to attention as Kiba leapt down to join them and Akamaru, and Kurenai followed.

"The point of this exercise was to show you the kind of missions you'll be undertaking in the future. Speed and endurance…Shino, you reached the scroll the fastest at one hour, although you did spend a while fighting with Kiba. Hinata, you covered a long distance very quickly."

"Y-yes," said Hinata, with the air of someone confessing a sin.

There was a pause.

"Would you mind telling us how you did that?" asked Kurenai.

"Um…well…"

_What do I say?_ thought Hinata. _I love you, mother, but I can't_ _say 'the memory of my dead mother inspired me to jump very high'. That sounds kind of strange._

"I guess I just got the hang of chakra-jumping," she said.

"How did you get so muddy before?" inquired Shino.

Hinata touched her index fingers together in embarassment.

"Um…I…sort of…missed a branch, and I…fell in a puddle."

"…oh."

"Hang on," said Kiba, rubbing his kunai-arm. "I think we're forgetting something here. The person who's team leader now, right?"

"It's still Kurenai-sensei," said Shino. "She has the scroll."

Kiba shook his head, still triumphantly.

"Nuh-uh," he said. "The rules were whoever first touches the scroll wins. Akamaru pretending to be me touched the scroll first."

Shino and Hinata both blanched at the idea, and they looked to Kurenai.

"Akamaru _did_ touch the scroll first-"

"Yeah!" shouted Kiba, punching the air.

"-but, I said 'whoever of you _**three**_'."

"Wh…"

Kiba drooped.

"Oh."

Shino watched as Kiba stuck his hands in his pockets, scowling.

_Any tactical intelligence that might've been present in Kiba has long since departed by now._

"Okay," said Kurenai. "I'll let you guys go home and shower now. You can all get back to Konoha okay?"

All three nodded, but Shino asked:

"Sensei, how did you see when we were about to reach the scroll? You were outside the forest the whole time."

"Ah," she said, "_that_. There are security cameras in various places all around this forest, so I mostly used those. Never underestimate the power of technology."

The genin stood up and began to leave, but Kurenai stopped one.

"Kiba," she said, "can you stay back for a moment?"

Groaning, Kiba acquiesed.

"G-goodbye, Kiba," said Hinata. "See you tomorrow."

She crouched, then jumped off into the nearest high tree.

Shino walked past to join her, and said:

"You were correct about the test being real."

He then followed Hinata.

The other two gone, Kiba and Kurenai changed stances. Kiba looked more relaxed, but less happy, staring off into space as he leant on a tree nearby. Akamaru trotted up to him, but he looked down at the dog in anger.

"Go stand guard," he commanded.

Akamaru growled.

"_Now_," he snapped.

This time Akamaru did leave, walking off into the trees testily.

Kurenai broke the silence.

"Ninja are meant to be as subtle as a speck of dust in the air," she said. "_You_ went through this exercise working as subtly as a brick."

"Yeah," acknowledged Kiba.

Kurenai once again repressed a sigh, and looked sternly down at her student.

"Kiba," she said, "Are we going to have a problem?"

Kiba frowned.

"Why would we have a problem?"

"How you speak to me, for a start," said Kurenai. "You're meant to call me 'Kurenai-sensei', or 'sensei'. Iruka told you this, I'm sure?"

He made no noise, as he would inevitably end up sighing annoyedly, so instead he simply nodded slightly.

"Squads are assigned to jonin because the Hokage feels you'd benefit from our experience in the field. We're here to teach you and to lead you. You criticised my rules repeatedly and picked fights with Shino instead of going to the actual objective, plus you – or Akamaru, I suppose – took the scroll recklessly. That kind of lone-wolf behaviour can get you killed on a real mission."

"It wasn't a real mission," said Kiba.

"We're not training here because we feel like it," said Kurenai. "You're meant to be learning, and instead you're just acting like I'm your enemy. If you don't want to be in a squad, you shouldn't come to training."

"Well, if I'm such a stupid genin, then no loss," responded Kiba, hands in pockets.

"You're not stupid, Kiba," she said sharply.

Kiba scowled back angrily.

"Look at our squad," he said. "Shino aces every test he's ever been in with blinking – not that you could tell, of course – and whatever special technique his clan has, it's probably a hell of a lot more useful than anything I have. Only reason Hinata's not the best in the class is 'cos she's so shy it's painful and Naruto barely notices she exists. And you, _Kurenai-sensei_, are **so**quiet and **so** fast you don't even need a squad. I _am_ stupid, and I don't know what I'm doing here."

His fuming done, he folded his arms.

"Now can I go home now, please?"

Kurenai considered Kiba. Despite his unusually deep voice for a twelve-year old, he was still just a kid. She had to explain this to him without making him feel any worse.

"You're strong," she replied.

"Hmm," he grunted, unconvinced.

"Your score on the written test was low, Kiba. Low enough that you would have failed if you hadn't been the second-highest on the taijutsu test."

"Second highest?" remarked Kiba in confusion. "Huh, Uchiha. Of course. Another perfect genin."

"Academically, Sasuke Uchiha is the best of the year," she admitted. "But he's not perfect. He's arrogant and a loner; not qualities you want in a squad-based profession. Shino, although he's not as advanced academically or physically as Sasuke is, is not exactly a people person either."

"Yeah, I got that," said Kiba. "…sensei."

He somehow managed to slouch further.

"So…what, I'm here to make friends?" asked Kiba disbelievingly. "I didn't exactly get on well with Shino today."

"You were reckless," Kurenai admitted, "but Shino..."

"...is some kind of robot?" suggested Kiba.

Kurenai cut to the point.

"Kiba, you're on this team because…"

Kiba again witnessed an unusual silence as Kurenai thought.

"…a team's like a person. It'll never work without a heart."

He stared in disbelief.

"You think I'm…a heart."

_What the hell kind of sensei did I get?_

She shook him from his confusion by asking:

"Kiba, what did you spend today doing?"

He thought on this.

"Uh…I got up…ate stuff…went to school-"

"With Hinata and Shino," she said. "I watched the three of you. You kept giving Hinata compliments-"

"She looked like they needed them!" interrupted Kiba. "Uh…sorry, sensei."

"No, that's right," she said. "She did look like she needed them. And every time she did, you were there for her. What'd you do with Shino?"

"Shino…I fought with him all the time."

"Why?"

"Well…" Kiba said. "It's just, like, he's sort of…"

He kicked at a clump of dirt nearby.

"…_weird_. Like, hard to read, y'know? I can't tell what he's about. Everything he says it sounds like he's been practicing how to say it in his head. Like he's written a speech before he even opens his mouth."

He looked back to his sensei.

"I mean…What kinda guy _is_ that?"

"Shino's not like everyone else," she admitted. "The Aburame clan doesn't raise children the way the Inuzuka do. You're gonna need to work a lot harder to get him to loosen up."

"Wh...me?" Kiba threw his hands up. "So it's now my job to turn Shino into a normal person? I'm here to be…a heart?"

"Can you think of anybody in your class, apart from Sasuke, that _really_ doesn't like you?" she asked.

Kiba considered this for some time.

"No…" he admitted. "But Hinata's the same – everybody likes her."

"Hinata is also extremely shy," said Kurenai. "Can you imagine Sasuke, Hinata and Shino together in a team? They'd never even try to work together, and teamwork is vital to a squad's success in missions. Plus, neither Hinata nor Shino are as good at taijutsu as you, and Akamaru was literally born to track people. Apart, all of us have flaws, but in squads, we can fill those flaws in."

Kiba was not satisfied.

"Sensei, I don't think you get this. I'm…"

"…emotional?"

He nodded.

"Shino never gets angry. Ever. He's never looked sad, or in pain, or anything. Nothing fazes Shino. That's why I don't like him, Kurenai-sensei. Everything that happens to him, it just does nothing. Nothing at all."

He sighed.

"And I don't get anything first try," he said, "or even second, usually. I can't think of plans, sensei. I just know how to run in and fight like hell."

"You can't think of plans?" she asked. "Then how did you think to switch yourself with Akamaru so well?"

"I…that was a fluke!"

She privately did not believe this, but instead said:

"Alright, Kiba. You're not as smart as Shino. But if Shino can't feel anything, that's not a strength. And if he can feel things, but he never lets them show, that's probably the biggest weakness anyone can have. You're luckier than he is. You don't care what people think, because when you find out what the right thing to do is, you do it without any hesitation."

Kiba was disturbed to realise how true this was.

"Hinata-"

"Hinata is more like you. She knows what's right and she can feel it. I know she can be a great ninja – maybe the greatest of all. But she's scared. She's afraid of what will happen to her if she steps on anybody's toes. Hinata lets herself be kept down by her emotions."

She put a hand on his shoulder.

"You let them control you sometimes, but in the end you have power over them. They let you see what Shino can't right now, and they can take you to places Hinata won't dare to go yet. You're the right person for this squad, and the right ninja for me to train. _That's_ why you're in my squad."

She silently let Kiba process this.

"Hinata's too emotional…" he said. "Shino's too…unemotional. I'm in the middle…and you want me to help them get better?"

Kurenai nodded.

Doubt lingered in his mind.

"You really think _I_ can do all that?"

Kurenai raised her head.

"Yes," she said. "But, I could be wrong. Maybe you can't."

"I'll do it," said Kiba immediately.

Kurenai permitted herself a smile.

Kiba rubbed the side of his neck in thought. He then nodded as if coming to a decision, and knelt down in front of Kurenai. Kurenai stepped back, surprised.

"W-what're you doing?" she asked, looking around in confusion.

"Kurenai-sensei, I'm sorry for my previous conduct," he recited. "From now on, I vow to follow your orders, keep the squad together, and kick ass. I swear this as a ninja of the Inuzuka clan."

Here he bowed a little lower. Shrugging, Kurenai guessed:

"I…accept your vow, Kiba. Uh, rise a ninja of Konoha."

Kiba smiled, and stood up again.

"It's the Inzuka Oath of Service," he explained. "We used to swear it to the Hokage whenever we became genin."

Kurenai smiled at him.

"So you vow to follow my orders, keep the squad together, and 'kick ass'?"

"It wasn't _quite_ the vow's exact words," admitted Kiba. "I kinda shortened it. It's meant to go on for twenty minutes, but I figured you'd wanna go home soon, Kurenai-sensei."

"Thankyou, Kiba," she responded. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Yes, Kurenai-sensei."

Stepping back, Kurenai leapt away.

Kiba stood up straight, eyes flicking through the trees. He brought his hands to the back of his head and sighed.

"_Ay_."

_So…I gotta save Shino from being a tightass, and help Hinata get over her fears… __**This**__'ll be interesting…_

By now, Kiba did not doubt that he would succeed; the only real question in his mind was how he'd do it. But brainstorming for Kiba was useless without someone to bounce ideas off, someone he trusted…and most importantly, someone who couldn't tell him in words his ideas were stupid.

"Akamaru?" he called.

Slowly, the little nose of the dog peeked out from behind a tree, and Akamaru's head followed. The dog peeked out at Kiba, looking annoyed at him.

"Hey," he said, "you can stop standing guard now."

Akamaru woofed and waved his head around.

"Aw, c'mon, don't be like that! I didn't mean that stuff about Shino's technique being better than you."

The dog remained unconvinced.

"I was pissed off! I'd just lost the scroll!"

Akamaru looked at him.

"Okay, _we_ just lost the scroll."

More frosty silence.

"…thankyou for being my decoy," he said. "I couldn't've done this without you."

Akamaru came out from behind the tree. Cautiously he stalked over to Kiba, who knelt.

"You're still my best friend," Kiba said. "Even if I do have to help Hinata and Shino out with being normal, remember?"

Pausing, Akamaru still waited for a moment. Then, he leapt at Kiba to send him to the ground, enthusiastically licking his master's face and barking.

"Hey! Hey! Stop! C'mon!"

Kiba pulled Akamaru off of him.

"Ugh! Now my head smells like your breath!"

Akamaru barked.

"Well, _more_ like your breath. Stupid mutt."

The tiny dog woofed again as he made his way up to Kiba's head.

"You ready?"

He nudged Kiba.

"Okay," the boy said, and he chakra-jumped off into the rapidly approaching night.

0000000000

Unlike Hinata (who barely spoke to her appointed retainers) or Kiba (who had none), Shino was actually on quite good terms with his minder, Zangai Aburame. The twenty-two year old did not only and specifically guard Shino, but Shino felt that there was a connection between them that he didn't really have with anyone else.

Zangai was tall, like most Aburame, and quite thin. Unlike most Aburame, however, his hair was blond; his father had been a businessman from the Land of Waves that had moved to Konoha and married an Aburame woman.

The two sat in the Eastern Hall of the Aburame compound, colloquially called 'the Nest' by some Aburame. Contrary to urban legend, the compound did not stretch hundreds of miles underground, nor did it have a network of subterranian passages all under Konoha; that would be a massive security risk. It was also not home to an enormous flying beetle that was the true leader of the clan, as Shino had once heard one rather wild-looking man claim to a group of enraptured onlookers. Built in the time of Shino's great grandfathers, the compound held virtually the entire clan within a deceptively small space.

The Eastern Hall was huge, but only Zangai and Shino were present at that point. Enormous lights illuminated the stone hall as the two ate.

Picking up rice with his chopsticks, Zangai broke the silence that had been in place since the start of the meal.

"How did your first training session transpire?" he asked, his sunglasses reflecting the high, soft light above.

Shino finished chewing, and said:

"It was…"

He considered his day. What had it been? Interesting, certainly. Trying? Difficult? Complex? Confronting?

"…well," he finished.

Zangai said nothing, but nodded in acceptance of this brief statement.

'_Well',_ Shino thought, annoyed at himself. _'Well'. I think I should read the dictionary again._

Both ate on in silence, until Shino said:

"My teammates…they are unusual."

"How so?" asked Zangai.

"Both are over-emotional," said Shino. "One alternates between extreme nervousness, sadness, lack of accurate judgement of her own qualities…potentially depressive. The other is prone to wild delusions of grandeur."

"What are their names?"

"Hinata Hyuga, Kiba Inuzuka," Shino responded.

Zangai contemplated this.

"The girl is a Hyuga…and yet she does not have a great deal of percieved self-worth?"

"No. Her ability obviously outstrips her confidence."

At first, Shino knew what he said was true, but then he thought again. She had been very low at the beginning of the training with Kurenai, her chakra-jumping poor…but then when he'd seen her again, she'd been much more competent. There, the power that he felt in her was much greater than before, he could understand that now. But how could that have happened?

He knew that chakra was made up of physical and spiritual energy. She had no physical change between their points of meeting, apart from being somewhat mud-covered, but her spiritual energy…

Shino had always been unsure about the 'spiritual energy' aspect of chakra. What exactly, _was_ it? Every source he had consulted was vague, only alluding where explanations were needed. Could Hinata have found a massive boost of spiritual energy in that forest? If so, how?

These were too many questions for Shino, so he spoke again:

"Hyuga…are they usually calm? I have observed them in the village, and they seem unmarred by problems of temperament."

"Seemingly," said Zangai. "However, Hyuga are not like Aburame. They prefer courtesy and ritual to logic and rationality; they would rather save face than save time or energy. It is a fact that Hyuga, despite the masks that they wear, are ruled more by their emotions than they care to admit."

Shino looked to his minder.

"Zangai…don't we wear masks?"

Zangai did not need to be told that Shino was being figurative, but he slid his sunglasses up closer to his face as he prepared to answer the question.

"We are deeper than the faces we hide," he said. "We do not let our thoughts be seen by others without our knowledge. It is only actions that should be seen. A ninja unknown is a ninja all-powerful."

"So I have been told," said Shino. "And yet my squadmates, who are obviously emotional, were as competent as I during the exercise with Kurenai-sensei."

Zangai drank.

"I see."

They did not speak for a time, both eating their rice in silence. As Shino finished, however, Zangai said:

"Do not be troubled by the nature of your squadmates. Even clan members that should perform their duties more strictly have permitted their feelings concerning each other to negatively affect their actions."

Shino asked: "Truly?"

Zangai nodded.

"I have witnessed altercations involving Inuzuka and Hyuga members before," he said. "The Hyuga claimed that the Inuzuka was overly familiar with their dog partner on a regular basis, whilst the Inuzuka replied by accusing the Hyuga of being both the result of and a participant in repeated inbreeding."

Zangai put his spoon back into the bowl, and finished:

"Violence ensued."

Shino laughed. He knew it was a lecture disguised as a joke – or possibly a joke disguised as a lecture, he was unsure – but that Zangai had given him the opportunity to laugh was a subtle kindness that other minders didn't always give him.

It was a strange thing, really. For a moment, he had let himself laugh at something momentary that passed into nothingness in seconds. It felt…positive. Unusually positive. This was a sharper, warmer positive thought than he would get from reading his books; it was like a butterfly, as compared to an elephant beetle.

Another thought crossed his mind, but he quelled it quickly, and he did not think upon it at all for the rest of the night. Yet it planted a seed in his mind, a germination that would come to grow in the time ahead of him.

_What if I could feel like that all the time?_


	5. D Rank

I LIIIIIIVE!

Yes, true believers, Memorium Activity is still out there and writing fanfiction for your reading pleasure! Occasional nine-month long breaks may occur, but nothing bar death or dismemberment can stop me from writing about teenage ninja! (Yeah, that 'once every two weeks' update schedule sort of went out the window pretty fast, huh?)

So with only a small amount of further ado, I shall give you this update. I'd also like to say that I'm planning on looking for a beta reader soon, so hopefully they'll make everything run a bit smoother around here, grammatically and plot-wise if not schedule-wise.

Here it be!

* * *

_Chapter Five: D-Rank_

Shino walked through the open field, the misty ground reflected in the glint of his sunglasses. The ground felt cold as he stepped on the morning grass and felt the dew cling to the soles of his sandals, but the pilgrim pressed on to the memorial, dark glasses and high jacket hiding his trepidation. He stopped in front of the black slab of stone, and knelt before it on the grass.

"Hello, mother," he said quietly.

The need for secrecy about this was obvious. To begin with, Shino didn't want to deal with people asking about how his mother had died, because he was unsure himself – the mission had been classified. He had kept it from everyone – from his classmates, from Iruka, from the whole village – because his father had told no-one, and in any case he didn't want to go through what he'd felt when he heard the news the first time again. He wasn't sure he could stay focused if it was brought to the forefront of his mind, so he never brought it up. Finally, there was his concern about how irrational this was, and how little others might think of him for even trying it.

He focused on her name, the characters etched into the memorial, and spoke again.

"I graduated," he said. "And I'm in a squad."

He added: "The…best marks in the squad."

A shadow covered his face as a cloud passed by overhead, and he continued.

"But…not overall. Sasuke Uchiha is the better ninja."

Staring into the stone, he blinked quickly to avoid crying. He knew he was talking to nothing, knew that staring at his mother's name carved into a stone could not possibly let him speak to her, and yet he couldn't stop shivering, couldn't end the twitch in his eye as he breathed out into the cold air, his breath adding to the layer of fog. For a long time, Shino stared out into the blank, grey expanse, the memorial a beacon for his mind, a place he never wanted to go to but always did.

Then, far above him, a leaf fell, and his thoughts were disrupted. Inside of him, a slow pulse of chakra emanated out, and his skin buzzed quietly as the consciousness within him told him to be warm. He nodded as it healed him, if only for a moment, and stopped blinking so fast. Shino then pushed his fallen glasses back up to his eyes and bowed his head to the stone.

"Thankyou," he said, but to who, he was no longer certain.

He stood carefully and looked to the sky. He saw that the day was bright where the cloud had lifted, and turned his back to the stone. He didn't do this every day, but he always left early when he did. Another mourner always came there and lingered for hours, a living one haunting the place of the dead, and he didn't want to interrupt the jonin. He wondered for a moment who Kakashi was there to see, but then dismissed the thought as not his business, and began walking home.

Behind Shino, the mist began to clear.

00000

Hinata stood on the grass, facing forward and with her eyes alert. She moved her right hand forward in a quick arc, watching carefully the stairs that led up to the walkway back to the main courtyards. A little way behind her was the beginning of forest, the very edge of the well-manicured grass ending a few metres away as it began to grow wild beneath the trees. Nobody else seemed to go there, and she liked it that way.

She turned to her left. Her legs still outward, she struck at the air with her left hand bunched into a fist, then pulled it back again in a sharp motion. She made no noise when she did this, which Iruka had always told her was the wrong way. Kata were not generally practiced in situations where silence was vital, and making some form of noise 'expelled non-vital chakra', as Ino had eagerly said a very long time ago. And yet, Hinata said nothing. In the Hyuga compound, making noise – any noise - attracted attention. In this case, unwanted attention.

It wasn't that she was banned from this part of the compound, although she couldn't have known if she was. The Hyuga gave commands, but they rarely gave out instructions; it was expected that everyone knew the rules already. Etiquette was taught by example: the good examples were pointed out, and the bad examples were the failures. Children were taught to scorn their peers for getting a name wrong, for shame was considered the best teacher. Hinata guessed that the clan's lack of concrete rules was a part of its constantly changing power structures, although maybe it was also to give those in control a great deal of leeway. If they knew she was here, they might approve, disapprove or be apathetic (which she knew was most likely in her case); it was basically up in the air. In contrast, her practicing taijutsu would probably be approved of, albeit in clipped tones. Hinata was known, _very_ well known, for being a slow learner.

The problem she had was the taijutsu itself. The reason she practiced the kata so far from the compound and so early, the reason she kept herself as quiet as she could, was that it was the wrong _kind_ of taijutsu.

As the clan heiress…as the _ex _-clan heiress, she should have been using Gentle Fist. She should have been the best in the clan at the Hyuga taijutsu, the art so zealously guarded by the clan. Gentle Fist was the taijutsu of little physical force but great chakra power. It could paralyse entire bodies, break chakra seals and, at the highest levels, even cause heart attacks. It was part of Hinata's birthright as the daughter of the clan leader, but she didn't use it.

She _could_, of course; she knew how to bring out the thin needles of chakra in her palms as well as any other Hyuga. It wasn't that Hinata couldn't use Gentle Fist at all; it was more that she couldn't use it well. She had the worst technique of any Gentle Fist user in living memory (she had been informed as such by her trainers at age ten) and in the intervening years between then and now, they had seen no improvement. Hinata was only capable of the bare minimum; she could not shut down anyone's chakra networks any more than she could spin-kick the moon. Eventually, after years of trying to no avail, her trainers gave up and told her to practice it by herself.

She should have practiced it, really, and for a while she did. After the trainers had gone, she diligently memorised the forms, read as much as she could on chakra networks and punched trees until her hands bled. For a good six months, Hinata trained in Gentle Fist.

Then, suddenly, as if a switch had been thrown in her brain, she realised that the trainers didn't care. They didn't ever ask her how her training was going or whether she was improving; they had given her up as a lost cause and moved on to train Hanabi instead. Freed from her obligations by the elders' sheer apathy, she realised she could basically do whatever she wanted instead of train in Gentle Fist. They weren't going to check.

So she practiced in a different style, a taijutsu form that most Hyuga sneered at. Every day since she gave up Gentle Fist, she trained in Whirling Leaf instead.

Whirling Leaf was, as taijutsu styles went, not highly regarded. It was a child's training taijutsu; every ninja in Konoha learned it. Every ninja knew its strengths and weaknesses. And, sooner or later, every ninja stopped training in the basic forms of it and started specialising.

Every ninja but one. Every shinobi, and every kunoichi but Hinata Hyuga. She was the world's only twelve-year old Whirling Leaf practitioner.

Because if she was going to be a disgrace to her clan, then she might as well be a disgrace that could fight.

She took a different approach, however, to certain other disappointments she knew. Much as she would have loved to shout her defiance from the rooftops like Naruto always did, she kept her secret Whirling Leaf training low-key. She would train in her bedroom for a while before she left to go to school or join her squad, always very early. But even though it had only been a week since normal classes ended – permanently, she was beginning to realise - she missed training in taijutsu at the academy. She missed seeing everyone in class move through the same warm-ups, missed Iruka's directions, missed Naruto's triumphant victories and massive losses, both of which he seemed to treat with the same boisterous vigour.

But most of all, she missed training in Whirling Leaf outside. So today, she had snuck out of her room even earlier than normal and had gone to the quietest place she could find. As far from the hawklike eyes of the elders as she could be, here was the place Hinata could be herself at home.

Whirling Leaf wasn't Hinata's only secret vice, though. It had not escaped her attention just how much she was eating lately. At first, it had just been a niggling feeling after normal meals, a feeling she was still hungry. Then it developed more, further, to the point where she was beginning to think Choji's idea of eating chips in class was a good idea. Then she started quietly sneaking more rice balls into her lunch box. She tried not to, but if she didn't, she always ended up feeling faint in the last class of the day. Besides, the kitchen staff made so many rice balls; surely no-one would notice. She hoped they didn't. Hinata knew she couldn't be a great mistress of Gentle Fist, but she still didn't want people to think she was greedy. She still sort of wanted to be graceful, after all.

_Not like the women elders_, she thought as she turned to her right and kicked forward. _Maybe like Kurenai-sensei._

There was a creaking noise behind her, and Hinata instinctively stopped kicking and looked back. Behind her, up on the walkway that led back to the courtyards of the Hyuga compound were two councillors, both tall and reserved-looking in the growing daylight. Neither had the Byakugan activated, but Hinata still wasn't sure they hadn't seen her practice Whirling Leaf. She turned to face them.

"Lady Hinata," said the taller councillor, stepping down from the walkway to stand in front of Hinata.

"G-good morning, Councillor Hachiro," said Hinata.

"Lady Hinata," said the shorter one. "You are a chunin now?"

"N-no, Councillor Akemi," said Hinata. "I…I was j-just made a genin."

Hachiro and Akemi exchanged disapproving looks. Hinata wondered what kind of twelve-year old could be expected to be a Chunin, and wished she was brave enough to tell the councillors what exactly they could go and do.

"...Lady Hinata, what was that taijutsu style you were just practicing?"

Hinata froze. She couldn't lie and say it was Gentle Fist; they would see through that immediately by virtue of the fact that Gentle Fist's kata looked nothing like Whirling Leaf's. She looked down at her shoes, mind racing, until she came up with an excuse.

"Wh-whirling Leaf," she said.

Their reactions were as she'd expected; both took on a slightly sour expression. She guessed it was better than the smug looks some elders seemed to wear whenever they spoke with her.

"Whirling Leaf," said Akemi, as if her tongue was unused to the words. "And why were you not practicing the clan's taijutsu instead, Lady Hinata?"

"S-servants," she said.

Hachiro frowned.

"Servants, Lady Hinata?"

"Y-yes," she said.

They both stared at her blankly, but Hinata was fairly sure she had this one covered. Some main-house members of the clan were terrified of idea of the branch members gaining any kind of power. They were basically the designated fear-scapegoat of the main family, the ones the main house either tried to belittle or always spoke of in hushed tones.

"I-if I practiced the clan's techniques outside, then branch m-members might see what they are and copy them," she said.

Hachiro seemed to fall for it, or at least recognise it was as good a reason as any not to perform the martial secrets of the Hyuga clan, and nodded in acceptance. Akemi, on the other hand, laughed, a high, noble tone with no warmth whatsoever filling the courtyard.

"Lady Hinata," she said, "there is _no_ chance that a branch member could-"

"_Councillor_," said Hachiro sharply.

She stopped, and looked at him. From where Hinata stood, she couldn't see that much, but the look that Hachiro gave Akemi was undoubtedly significant, cautious. Akemi nodded slowly in response, and turned back to Hinata.

"In any case, Lady Hinata, no branch member should be in this area. This is not something you should concern yourself with."

Hinata wasn't quite brave enough to openly glare at either of the councillors, but she'd about had enough of their haughty tones this early in the morning. Hoping to at least take them down a peg, she murmured:

"Sh-should a councillor be laughing at the daughter of the clan leader?"

Sudden looks of abject panic dotted the faces of the councillors, and both fell over themselves scrambling to find the right platitudes to apologise correctly.

"-we are greatly sorry-"

"-our actions were an affront-"

"-loss of dignity-"

"Th-thankyou, councillors," said Hinata, once she'd heard enough. "I think it's breakfast time, anyway."

"Yes, Lady Hinata," said Hachiro, bowing as he backed up to the stairs.

"Thankyou," said Akemi, bowing following. "Lady Hinata."

"We wish you a good morning," said Hachiro, passing out of sight.

"Yes," said Akemi, disappearing a moment later.

Once they were gone, Hinata allowed herself a smile. Looking away from the stairs, she could see the sun rising through the trees, clouds turning pink in the path of the world's closest star.

_Second day of missions,_ she thought.

"Weak."

Hinata spun around, heart racing far too much faster than what it should have been. Standing in front of her was Neji, her cousin and (she had once worked out) also genetically her half-brother. He shared her pale skin, blank eyes and dark hair. Truth be told, Neji's hair was much more lustrous than Hinata's was, which mystified her somewhat (he didn't seem to be the haircare routine type). He was, if anything, even quieter than Hinata usually was, but it was more out of contempt for speaking to anyone than shyness.

He was a child of the branch-line of the Hyuga clan, on the lower end socially. Every branch-family member was forced to wear a mark on their head, a mark that caused excruciating pain whenever a main family member made a specific hand sign. His father, her uncle, was dead; his mother had disappeared on a mission and never returned. Hinata felt like he possessed a sort of cold hatred for everything, and she thought she understood why.

Nonetheless, he had always frightened her.

"G-good morning, N-neji," she said.

"You don't know how to fight with the skills you were meant to be born to," said Neji, apparently seeing no point in social niceties when there was insulting to do. "So you settle for the lesser taijutsu instead."

Hinata had no idea what to say to that, so she said nothing.

"Of course," he said, even more contemptuously. "You are Lady Hinata. You don't have to answer a branch-member."

He turned and began to walk back up the stairs.

"N-Neji," she said. "Please-"

He kept walking forward.

Breathing out, she followed after him.

"Neji," she said, putting her left hand on his shoulder, "I don't-"

There was a rapid movement and a flash of light, and Hinata's right arm suddenly felt like ice. Neji stood in front of her, smiling harshly, his left hand at her right shoulder, eyes blazing with the Byakugan. He'd turned around with her left hand occupied, leaving a clear shot at the right.

Hinata groaned in her head. Would she have to think about tactics all the time if she was to keep Neji from attacking her? Was this the kind of life a kunoichi always had?

She looked to Neji in confusion, but his smile had disappeared as he stepped away, reverting to the look of quiet disdain he usually harboured. Wasn't he concerned about the punishment he'd get for attacking a main family member?

"Neji-"

He looked back at her.

"Tell them," he said. "Tell them you lost to a branch member."

She had nothing to say.

He left her there, her right arm useless.

00000

The sky was overrun with light-grey cloud as Hinata left the Hyuga compound, walking quietly through the open gates, nodding to the guards who briefly made eye-contact then went back to staring impassively at the path ahead. The Hyuga estate was on the very edge of Konoha, something that Hinata had once heard her father say was a sign of the village's trust in the clan, so she had a while to walk before she could meet her squad at the Hokage building.

First, however, she decided she'd take a slight detour. It was quite early, after all, so she wouldn't be late meeting her squad, and there was someone she needed to see. After what Neji did, Hinata wasn't feeling as happy as she had been when she'd got up, and there was one very easy way to make Hinata feel happier.

Buoyed by the thought of it, Hinata ran down the path towards the rest of the village. Passing by the leaf-shedding trees that surrounded the Hyuga estate – although really, Konoha's trees seemed to be in a sort of permanent semi-autumn, so basically _every_ tree was deciduous – she ran out into a sidestreet. Locals nodded politely to her as she slowed down, then headed for the main road.

The sight that greeted her was no less chaotic than the first time she'd been out on this road alone on her first day of school. Hundreds of people, more than a few carts pulled by oxen and even a horse covered the road, but she was not quite so intimidated by it all anymore. Hinata didn't mind crowds, provided she was just a part of them and not their centre of attention. Looking over the scene, not using the Byakugan but still with a fairly practiced eye, she noticed the long tan trenchcoat-wearing kunoichi she'd been looking for, and hurried over to talk to her.

Squeezing past farmers and other ninja, Hinata reached Anko as she sat on the stool of a small breakfast stall, just finishing her bean-sauce dumplings on a stick. It took a second for the older woman to notice Hinata, but when she did a look of surprised happiness appeared on her face.

"Hinata!" she cried.

"Hello, Anko-neesan," said Hinata, not quite matching Anko's enthusiasm.

Sliding onto the stool next to Anko, Hinata saw her smile disappear, an anxious look in the older kunoichi's eyes as she studied her. She looked down for a moment.

"Uh…"

Hinata looked up to see Anko scratching the side of her arm with the other hand, a pained expression on her face.

"…I'm sorry I didn't get to see you graduate."

Hinata frowned in confusion, then realised. She'd thought Anko would notice her arm first.

"Oh, th-that's alright, Anko-neesan," she said. "I'm sure you had a lot to do that day."

Anko shook her head.

"Not an excuse," she said, determined. "I said I'd be there, and I wasn't."

"I-it's fine," said Hinata. "I mean, you can't be in two places at once."

"Guess not," said Anko, some of her good humour returning. "I guess I'll hafta make up for it by being at your wedding twice."

Hinata blinked, then said:

"M-my wedding? I'm n-not getting m-married, neesan."

"Well," said Anko, drinking, "maybe you will someday."

She grinned.

"You can marry blond guy," she suggested.

"Wh-who?" asked Hinata, turning pale.

"Y'know," said Anko, chewing on the dumpling stick. "Blond guy. The one who wears all the orange."

Hinata blushed, pointing her fingers together as Anko leaned down, a catlike smile on her face.

"'Cos ya like him," she said.

"Sh-shut up, neesan," said Hinata. "I m-mean, _I_ never talk about the boy you like."

"That's 'cos you don't know who that is," said Anko, unintimidated. "'Sides, uh…"

Looking to her left and right, she tossed a few coins onto the stall's table and put an arm around Hinata, stooping so as to steer the shorter girl out into the road again. Soon standing up straight, Anko led Hinata up the road as she spoke.

"Well," she said, brandishing the dumpling-stick, "Hinata, I think you're old enough to know now…I don't really stick to one guy at a time."

Hinata nodded slowly. She'd inferred as much, but she didn't think it would do to let Anko know that.

"Neesan," she said, in an attempt at a stern voice, "Y-you really shouldn't string boys along like that. I m-mean, what if they think you'll just kiss _anybody_?"

Anko stopped walking. She looked to Hinata to discern whether she was being serious…yes, she was.

_It has been a loooong time since I was twelve,_ she thought.

"Hinata," Anko began, realising she'd put herself in a very difficult situation, "Later, I _may_ need to explain some things to you."

Hinata attempted to cross her arms, but her right arm was still numb, so she just stuck her hands in her pockets instead. She privately very much doubted Anko could tell her anything she didn't know already. Honestly, some people thought she didn't know anything at all.

"A-alright, Anko-neesan," she said, humouring her.

Anko, however, was not listening. She was looking at Hinata's right arm, hanging noticeably differently to the left.

"What happened to your arm?" Anko asked, all joking gone out of her voice.

"…oh," said Hinata, gesturing to the arm and smiling. "U-um, I accidentally hit myself while I was using Gentle Fist."

Anko stared at her incredulously.

"Hinata," she said, "that's not possible."

Hinata shook her head, and demonstrated by hitting her right shoulder with her left hand.

"No," said Anko. "Taijutsu like Gentle Fist work because everyone's chakra flows different, so having part of someone else's chakra pushed into you causes your own flow to be disrupted."

Hinata had hoped Anko didn't know that, and wondered how she did.

"Hinata-" Anko began.

"I have to go now," said Hinata. "B-but it's fine now, see?"

She attempted to hold her right hand up and wave it around, and was happy to see she mostly succeeded.

Anko stared at her, an expression of un-Anko-like concern on her face.

"We'll talk about this later," she said.

"O-okay," Hinata responded.

She stepped away from Anko, then concentrated for a chakra jump.

"One more thing, though," said Anko.

Letting the chakra dispel, Hinata looked back.

"Yes?"

Anko looked as if she were about to say something else, but instead she laughed and smiled again.

"I like your headband," she said. "Looks good on you."

Hinata nodded.

"Th-thankyou, neesan."

She turned away and crouched again. The chakra rising to her legs, she thought about looking at Anko again, but somehow couldn't bring herself to. Her feet glowing and the soles warm, she pushed off from the ground, and Anko fell out of sight as she flew through the air, wind rushing at her face.

00000

Long before Hinata's birth, back even before the days of the Hidden Villages, ninja clans were not organised soldiers, but huge tribes of roving warriors that crossed the land as they willed. They would live through foraging, or mercenary work, or stealing if need be; back then, there was little difference between the ninja and the brigands they fought.

In time, though, the ninja clans made allegiances. They united to form Konoha, the first ninja village, and began to bring order to a lawless land. In exchange for a measure of autonomy, six clans - the Akimichi, Hyuga, Aburame, Nara, Senju and Uchiha - swore not to war with each other, but to work in unison against the bandits and monsters that stalked the land. Each clan would be represented through a council that would elect a Hokage, and each clan would commit itself to the defence of the land.

In time, of course, things changed. Konoha began as a loose confederation of clans; everyone kept to themselves, with precious little communication outside the Hokage's Council. There was no standardised unit of four ninja and no system of genin, chunin and jonin; clans follow the old ways. Then the clans started intermarrying, and things got complex. Clanless ninja were permitted to join Konoha, then later even civilians were educated as ninja. Education became (mostly) standardised for shinobi and kunoichi, regardless of their origins in a clan or as a civilian; it became standard to educate ninja in the village academy rather than within their clans. As the clan estates grew smaller, the village grew bigger. More and more, when children were asked where they were from, they didn't say they were from the Hyuga, or the Akimichi, they said they were from Konoha.

Naturally, some clans rose in power, like the Nara. Some fell in power, like the Uchiha. And some sort of melded into the general populace, like the Senju. But while plenty of new citizens joined Konoha, no new clans did.

Until the Inuzuka.

It was after the First Great Shinobi World War that they came to the Land of Fire, a clan more numerous than any in Konoha. They said they had come from the Land of Millet. Once the lowest of the peasants in that land, their first leader had discovered a way to bond with dogs, and so had led his people away from the harsh winters of the Land of Millet and into greener places. For a generation they had roamed the world as nomads, living off whatever they could and taking payment for small missions. They were how ninja clans once were, a living anachronism, but they'd had enough of such a life.

The Konohans were divided on the issue. After a generation of nomadic life, the Inuzuka's ability to live in a small village was questioned, as was their story of their origins. (The records of the Clan Council sessions discussing the Inuzuka note that the Nara representative repeatedly asked "What the hell kind of a name for a country is 'the Land of Millet'?") Some theorised that they were actually just rogue ninja from other villages that had been displaced by the war, or that they were spies looking to harm Konoha in its moment of weakness. The Hyuga representative claimed that the Inuzuka were actually better ninja than any of the Konoha clans, because they had "retained their natural state in connection with the land", and suggested that the Konoha clans become nomads like the Inuzuka instead. (The records of the sessions note that the Aburame representative coughed loudly and profanely dismissed the Hyuga representative's ideas at the same time, and also that the Nara representative chose this point to start napping.)

Nevertheless, the Inuzuka had obvious experience as ninja, and their knowledge of a good part of the Land of Fire was clearly useful. They were thus accepted into Konoha, and managed to fit in eventually, although the Uchiha were contemptuous and the Nara were suspicious. The Hyuga considered them rough, but still fairly useful, and so they were on mostly good terms. The Aburame considered their methods odd, but they couldn't argue with their results.

Kiba's grandfather had been the first Inuzuka born in Konoha, but even so, Kiba had always felt like the Inuzuka had been there forever. The Inuzuka estate was small in comparison to every other clan's, but it was big enough to explore for hours and never get bored. He felt like there had never been a time at all when the Inuzuka hadn't wandered the leaf-strewn streets of the hidden village; life outside its walls was a distant memory to a boy like Kiba. That was the world, to Kiba – impossibly old, but never changing.

_**Almost**__ never changing_, Kiba thought.

He then grimaced at this idea, pushed it to the back of his mind and tried to concentrate on working his way through the Hokage Building. He didn't like to think of it, he didn't need to think of it. He didn't need what had left him that day.

Kiba had been telling himself that a lot lately.

He turned a corner and stopped abruptly as he almost ran into Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura, now in a squad together. Their sensei was a tall, grey-haired young man named Kakashi, who spoke in a fairly even voice and always carried around a book entitled _Makeout Paradise_. Kiba thought this was kind of cool, and almost wished he'd gotten Kakashi as a sensei instead of Kurenai, although preferably not in a squad with Naruto, Sasuke or Sakura. Sasuke was annoyingly talented and absurdly cruel to his fangirls (_Which is a pity_, thought Kiba, _because if anyone needs a girlfriend, it's Sasuke_), Sakura was annoyingly pushy and prone to launching into long, uninvited lectures, and Naruto was just plain annoying.

Kiba nodded to the squad.

"Morning," he said.

_Hmm_, thought Kakashi. _Definitely an Inuzuka._

It had been a morning for family resemblances. He'd noted the Nara and Akimichi boys as looking a lot like Shikaku and Choza. He'd also seen Hinata Hyuga and her Aburame squadmate pass by, which answered something he'd been puzzling out ever since he'd gotten there. That morning, Kakashi had seen a group of ants near the Memorial frantically making concentric circle shapes; now, he realised why. The Aburame boy was the son of Kemushi Aburame, who had died on a mission a few months ago, and presumably he had caused the ants to move erratically when he visited the Memorial. Whether he'd done it on purpose or completely by accident was unclear, but even Aburame couldn't keep their emotions bottled up all the time.

Looking again at Kiba, Kakashi suddenly realised how much he looked like Tsume. This was the second genin he'd seen that day who would have been identical to their parent if not for their gender (the other was Ino Yamanaka, although she looked a lot like Koharu Utatane as well).

He stopped musing on such things and saw that Kiba was fidgeting while still looking up at him. His squad had already learned to be patient with him, as they were fairly used to the long, spaced-out stares Kakashi was fond of. It tended to make people who didn't know him underestimate his observation ability, even more so if they believed in the 'Copycat Ninja' legend that had sprung up around him. (Kakashi didn't really like that title, but when his mood was right and no-one was looking, he grinned to himself about it beneath his mask. On those rare occasions, he allowed himself to think that he was _maybe_ as cool as everyone else thought he was.)

"Hello, Kiba," said Kakashi. "Are you looking for Kurenai-san?"

"...oh," said Kiba. "Yeah, Kakashi-sensei."

"Hinata just passed by," said Kakashi, pointing.

Kiba nodded.

"Thanks, Kakashi-sensei."

He passed the squad and walked down the hall.

"That was sort of rude of you guys," Kakashi commented once he'd left.

Sakura looked up from her usual reverie of staring at Sasuke.

"Why?" she asked.

"None of you said 'good morning' or 'hello' to Kiba. In fact, none of you spoke at all."

The squad said nothing in response, but fidgeted awkwardly.

"Huh," muttered Sasuke.

Kakashi looked to him.

"'Huh' doesn't count as speaking, Sasuke."

Sasuke was about to say 'huh' to this, then realised it was sort of proving Kakashi's point, so he instead said nothing.

"Naruto," said Kakashi, "I'm surprised you didn't say anything to him."

"Huh?" Naruto blinked in confusion. "Why me, sensei?"

"Well," reasoned Kakashi, "it seems like out of the three of you, you're most like Kiba."

"_**No, I'm not!**_"

There was a silence as Naruto's oddly loud words caused the squad to stare at him. This was strange. It wasn't like Naruto's usual, ineffectual denials, and even though he wasn't that loud then, it seemed a lot clearer than how he usually spoke.

"…sensei," said Naruto, remembering his manners.

"Hmm," said Kakashi.

_Hypocrite_, thought Sasuke.

"A while ago," began Sakura, in a tone half lecturer and half gossip, "Naruto and Kiba got into a fight, and-"

Kakashi immediately said:

"That's not for you to say, Sakura."

Sakura nodded curtly, but did nothing else, and Sasuke rolled his eyes. Naruto, on the other hand, looked hurt, disturbed and not at all enthusiastic.

And that wouldn't do at all, Kakashi decided. Sakura could afford to be a know-it-all and Sasuke could afford to be abrasive, but Naruto definitely couldn't afford to be low-key. It'd only been two days since they'd met, but Kakashi had noticed that.

He _was_ pretty observant, after all.

00000

Kiba found Hinata in a small room near the Hokage's office, staring out the window as she stood in a corner.

"Hey," he said.

She turned to him and nodded.

"G-good morning, Kiba."

"Sensei's not here yet?"

Hinata shook her head.

Kiba looked out the window for a moment, then said:

"You don't talk much, do you, Hinata?"

Hinata considered this.

"M-maybe y-you talk m-more than everyone else," she murmured.

Kiba thought this was a weird thing to say, and Hinata gasped almost immediately after, as if she hadn't really been concentrating.

"I'm s-sorry," she said.

Kiba shrugged.

"Well," he said, "maybe I do."

In point of fact, Kiba knew full well he talked more than everybody else, and Hinata didn't. That was the first part of his plan to persuade Hinata and Shino to come out of their shells: communication.

He focused again.

"But," he said, "like, if we're gonna be squadmates, I figure we should know more about each other, right?"

"W-we'll find out about each other," said Hinata.

"When?" asked Kiba.

Hinata studied him, curious, and said nothing. Under the weight of this gaze, which seemed innocuous, Kiba slowly admitted:

"I'm...asking you because I figure you're a lot more normal than Shino."

"Hmm," said Hinata, appreciative but uncertain.

"Something I've heard about the Hyuga…"

Hinata's eyes widened.

_What if he asks something secret?_

"...how big is your house?"

"Oh," said Hinata, relieved. "Uh…um…the c-compound is about the s-size of the Hokage Building."

"_Wow_!" said Kiba. "Your room must be _huge_!"

"…no, not really," Hinata said.

Kiba frowned.

"Why not?"

"W-well, a lot of people live in the compound."

"Huh," said Kiba. "That's weird. You'd think they've give you a decent room, what with you being the clan heiress and all."

Hinata sighed and looked down.

_I suppose nobody outside of the Hyuga knows yet..._

Kiba smiled knowingly at her as she looked up.

"Not easy, is it?" he asked. "Being the next in line."

Hinata looked confused, then worked it out. Of course! There were only about four Inuzuka in the entire clan. Kiba, his mother, his sister, and...his father, she supposed. But why would Kiba be clan heir? Even the Hyuga, the most traditional of the clans of Konoha, recognised the eldest child as the heir, not the eldest son! Surely, his older sister would be next in line...

Kiba picked up Akamaru off of his head, where he'd been sleeping. He shook him a little in an effort to get him awake, but the little dog keep snoozing.

"See this little fleabag here?"

Hinata nodded.

"Okay," said Kiba, "a _really_ long time ago, back when the Inuzuka had just decided they'd join Konoha, there-"

"Wh-what?" asked Hinata.

Kiba frowned.

"…the Inuzuka clan got here a few generations ago," he said.

"Th-they weren't there at the founding of Konoha?"

"Nope," said Kiba.

This was news to Hinata, who had thought that every clan had been part of Konoha for the entire history of the village.

"S-sorry," she said. "Please, go on."

"So, yeah," Kiba continued, "back 'round the time when the Inuzuka were deciding they'd join Konoha, they were still bonding with wild dogs."

Hinata assumed he meant that the Inuzuka of that time had a connection with wild dogs, like Kiba's connection with Akamaru.

"Before they officially moved into Konoha, this wolf pack approached them and said they wanted to bond with the Inuzuka."

Noticing the look on Hinata's face, he added:

"Yeah, they _said_ that. Some of our dogs can talk, by the way. Anyway, The clan leaders knew that the wolves were fearsome and powerful, but they also knew they weren't like dogs. They were wild. Maybe wild enough to hurt the wrong side, or even to kill their bond partner.

"So, he agreed to let them join the Inuzuka, but on one condition-"

"Wolves don't live in packs."

The source of the latest interruption was Shino, who had evidently stepped out of nowhere.

Kiba stared at him, a surprised look on his face.

"Uh, excuse me?"

"Wolves don't live in packs," said Shino. "They are predominately solitary animals, unless they have mated, in which case the male and female will live with their offspring. There is no alpha-male system."

"Oh," said Kiba, "so you think you know more about wolves than me?"

"Yes."

"Yeah...well...you don't."

"Unsubstantiated," said Shino.

"_You're_ unsubstantiated! And who the hell asked you, anyway?"

Shino didn't bother to respond to this.

Kiba glared at Shino and almost growled at him. Why was he being so difficult? How was he meant to convince Shino to be more open when he was such a jerk all the time?

_And...dammit!_

He'd meant to make Hinata talk more, but he'd spent basically the whole time that morning talking himself. The plan was not going well.

Scowling, Kiba waited with his squadmates for a minute or so more when Kurenai arrived, carrying slips of paper.

"Good morning," she said.

All three of them nodded.

"I've already got our missions," she added, "so we don't need to see the Hokage himself."

Hinata was a mote disappointed. She rather liked the Hokage, even if she did hear other Hyuga calling him disparaging things like 'dirty old man'. Hinata's grandparents were all dead, but she had always thought of the Hokage as a good replacement, although he was more like everybody's grandfather than hers specifically.

"So what's our first mission?" asked Kiba as they walked out of the Hokage Building and into the sunlight.

Kurenai consulted the paper.

"A cat named Mister Mittens has gone lost," she said, stopping at the steps of the building. "Black and white, has a collar with his name on it."

"And we catch it?" asked Kiba.

"Yes," said Kurenai. "Go."

The three genin looked at each other, then at Kurenai.

"I've seen you three take my orders pretty well," she said, "but now I want to see how you work when I'm not there. Independence is a key ninja skill."

"What do we do?" asked Shino.

"Asking Kurenai-sensei what we do is kind of against the point, Shino," said Kiba.

Shino pushed his glasses up, frostily.

Kiba turned around and began walking away from Kurenai. Hinata turned away as well, and Shino reluctantly followed.

"Okay," said Kiba. "If we're gonna catch this cat, we'll need more than just skill."

"Wh-what do we need?" asked Hinata.

"_More_ skill!"

Shino resisted the urge to facepalm.

"Hinata," said Kiba. "I need you to chakra-jump around the village and scout for him."

"A-alright," said Hinata.

Kiba elaborated:

"You jumped really high in the forest two days ago, so you should be good at that."

Hinata smiled, and Kiba responded with a wide grin. She crouched, then chakra-jumped up into the air, quickly soaring far above Kiba's head and into the village.

_Plan's working_, he thought.

Then came the difficult part - Shino. Kiba turned around to face Shino, then attempted to look him in the eye. This failed due to Shino's glasses obstructing things, so Kiba instead looked in the vague area of where he assumed Shino's eyes were.

"You found the scroll first," he said, "so you should-"

"-track it," finished Shino as he leapt away.

"Hey!"

Crouching, Kiba timed his jump carefully, then jumped after him.

"I didn't tell you the whole plan!" he shouted as soon as he was in close contact.

"I have inferred it," said Shino, louder than usual so as to be heard over the rushing wind. "You and I are to track it from low, Hinata will cover the most distance using her chakra-jumping, and we will trap it in a three-dimensional pincer movement."

"...yeah," said Kiba, "that's right."

_Except I didn't know it was called a pincer movement._

"Then there is no need to tell me the whole plan," said Shino.

Jumping again, Kiba angrily shook his head.

_Man! It's like therapy-ing a wall,_ he mind-grumbled. _A wall with weird sunglasses._

Above and ahead of the two boys, Hinata used the Byakugan to search for the cat. She'd seen one or two black and white cats already, but they were inside houses, so she assumed they weren't Mister Mittens. Looking down streets and alleyways, her purple eyes scanned the village methodically.

Suddenly, she saw it. Mittens was on a rooftop, not far from her favourite bakery, washing himself calmly. Focusing the chakra in her legs, Hinata sort of steered herself down to the rooftop as slowly and gently as she could. Unfortunately, not gently enough. Through the sound of the wind or the rustling in its whiskers, Mittens knew Hinata was coming, and leapt back out of Hinata's grasp onto the ground below.

Hinata spun around to follow it and jumped low. Now only a few metres above the ground, she leapt from stall-roofs and lines, narrowly missing washing as she sped towards her target. She realised why ninja were trained to catch cats – they were small, elusive and very stealthy, ideal for harmless training exercises.

Above, Kiba began to realise his plan wasn't working.

"We're not getting anywhere," he said.

"I will assist Hinata," said Shino.

"Right," said Kiba, although he would have preferred Shino stay with him.

As Shino landed near Hinata, Kiba landed on a powerline pole and concentrated. The thousand scents that coursed through Konoha became deeply known to him, and he began to mentally sift through them to find cat scents. This was no easy task, because cats didn't really smell like much. Their saliva removed the odours from them; this was why cats were always washing themselves. Concentrating harder, Kiba found a cat-scent that had strong traces of both a bakery-smell and a Hinata-scent. He leapt down, then began following that.

A whirring sound buzzed through Shino's ears as he bounded through the streets, sometimes running and sometimes chakra jumping. He sent a strong '_**No**_' to the consciousness within him that yearned to be free, and redoubled his efforts, scant metres away from Hinata.

The blurred streets became a cacophony of images under the Byakugan, but Hinata was focused on one. Down one alleyway was the cat, sitting down calmly.

She abruptly turned, knocking over passersby as she went, and went for the cat immediately. It looked up and began to flee, but she had already jumped forward at that point.

With no place to go forward, the cat attempted to go up. It turned just before it left the ground and flew through the air to the side-wall of an apartment when suddenly Kiba appeared, leaping over the roof of the building and grabbing the cat in triumph, then grabbing onto a steel railing with his one free hand.

"Hah!" said Kiba. "Game's up, Mister Mittens!"

It squirmed in response, disdainful of the doggy smell of its young warden.

He then looked down.

"Woah...uh...can either of you guys help me?"

_Fool,_ thought Shino. _He only caught it through luck._

He decided that Kiba needed a lot of direction, and as Kurenai wasn't there, it fell to him to give him instructions.

"Jump down," he said.

"Oh, yeah, with a cat in one arm," said Kiba. "...actually, maybe I could drop him down to you guys?"

"K-kiba, I d-don't think that would work," said Hinata.

"Yeah it would," said Kiba, who was willing to argue even when hanging precariously four stories up. "Cats land on their feet, right?"

"Not at that height," said Shino.

He then added:

"Possibly you could concentrate chakra into your feet and walk down."

"What?" said Kiba. "What're you even talking about?"

"Hn," said Shino.

Kiba scowled.

_I heard that, jerk_, he thought.

"So how'm I gonna get down?" he shouted.

Shino sighed impatiently.

"That is your responsibility," he said.

"Really? 'Cos catching this cat is part of your mission too, so unless you help me get down, you get nothing."

"You should be able to extricate yourself without aid," said Shino.

"_You_ extricate yourself without aid!"

_Hey,_ thought Kiba,_ that one worked._

He then realised that Shino was the only other person to hear him say it, which saddened him. Nobody but he had witnessed his epic comeback. Then again, he was happy to see that Shino had apparently not gotten it; it was nice to see the genius look confused for once.

"Hey, wait," he said, "where's Hinata?"

Shino looked around.

"I don't know," he said.

"H-here."

Kiba looked up for the voice, and found Hinata standing on the balcony below.

"How'd you get up here?" he asked.

"I asked the people who live here," she said.

"...oh," said Kiba. "Yeah, that...makes sense."

He leaned over and handed her the cat, which stopped wriggling so much. He edged over to his left and stepped onto the balcony railing, then jumped down to Hinata's level.

They left the apartment building and rejoined Shino, then saw Kurenai across the road and went to meet her.

"Good job, all of you," said Kurenai. "I was watching. You all navigate Konoha well, so inner-city missions won't be too hard, and if you can catch a cat you can catch at least a civilian human...good work on getting Kiba down, Hinata."

Hinata smiled and nodded.

"Thankyou, sensei."

"So," said Kiba, "what now?"

"We take it back to the owner."

A short walk away, they found a modest house with a little girl waiting at the door. Eyes brightening as soon as she saw Hinata holding the cat, she ran up to the kunoichi and grinned.

"You found Mister Mittens!"

"Yeah," said Kiba. "took a while."

Hinata handed the cat over to the girl, which, now safely in her arms, started purring. Shino frowned at this, and peered at it curiously.

"He's a mommy!" said the girl.

Squad Eight looked confused.

"He had kittens a few weeks ago," the girl explained.

"Kittens?" said Kiba. "You sly old dog-who's-actually-a-cat, you!"

"I s-suppose it's not _Mister_ Mittens anymore, then," commented Hinata.

"But then he ran away today," said the girl.

"From _kittens_?" asked Kiba.

He pointed sternly at the smug-looking feline.

"Bad cat! Don't be a deadbeat!"

"What's a deadbeat?" asked the girl.

"Uh…never mind."

Shino looked to Hinata, in whose arms the cat seemed happiest (or, at least, not quite as likely to wriggle and hiss excessively).

"What's it doing?" he asked.

"Hm?"

"The cat," he said. "It's rumbling."

"It's p-purring," she responded.

_This does not answer the question_, thought Shino.

"S-so," she said, trying to avoid smiling, "you d-don't know so m-much about cats?"

Shino glared at her briefly, and stopped talking. Hinata nodded sharply and looked back at Kiba and the little girl, who were both playing with the cat.

"Anyway," said the girl, "we lost one of our kittens, too."

"Well, put it up on a missions board," said Kiba.

"I can't," said the girl. "My daddy said we couldn't afford that. But I'm sure it'll come back! Thankyou, ninja!"

The door closed, and the squad turned around to leave.

Hinata was mystified. How could Shino not know about purring? Even if he'd never been in close contact with a cat before, surely he would have read about it somewhere. Why was he so stoic all the time?

Judging by his reaction to even mild teasing, Shino was not the type to open up easily. Knowing this, Hinata kept all these questions to herself, and instead asked the most pressing question of that moment:

"H-how could they not afford a D-rank mission?"

Kurenai looked to her squad. She had to answer Hinata, but it was something all three should learn.

"Not everyone is as…"

_...I won't say 'lucky as you',_ thought Kurenai._ because being born a Hyuga is hardly good luck._

"…well-off financially as you, Hinata. That goes for you two as well."

"Us?" said Kiba.

"You all belong to clans," said Kurenai. "You're all rich."

"But-" Kiba protested.

"The Inuzuka are too, even in their current state," said Kurenai.

_Doesn't feel like it,_ thought Kiba.

"But you three, on the other hand, did just make 5000 ryo."

"F-five thousand?" asked Hinata. "...um, s-sorry-"

"That's okay," said Kurenai, "it is a lot. You all get 5,000 ryo each per D-rank mission. It goes directly to _your_ accounts, by the way – although you'll probably all be expected to give some of it to support your clans."

_I've never had this much money_, thought Hinata. _What could I spend it on?_

Hinata was suddenly assaulted with visions of a large blimp passing over Konoha with the words "NARUTO WILL YOU GO OUT WITH ME" written across it.

"...that wouldn't be practical at all," she thought out loud.

"Did you say something, Hinata?" asked Kurenai.

"N-no!"

00000

Shino stared down at his plate of rice and vegetables, so far about half-eaten. Kurenai had taken them to a restaurant to celebrate their success as a squad so far. Why she'd done this, when all the missions they had done apart from the cat-catching one were either gardening or garbage collecting, Shino had no idea.

It galled him most, though, as to how nobody had seemed to notice how he was acting different. Despite the glasses and the long coat, Shino knew full well that thinking about his mother's death made much of the former tone go out of his voice, and he was definitely hunching more than usual. Kiba not noticing was unsurprising, but neither Hinata nor Kurenai had said anything either. What was wrong with them? If he'd seen somebody acting like him, he would have sent them to a medical-nin immediately. How had nobody yet noticed that-

"Shino," asked Kurenai, "are you okay?"

"Yes."

"Alright."

Shino suddenly realised what he'd said.

…_hn._

The meal itself was alright, as these things went. At home, Shino had been experimenting with eating food in the Aburame clan's particular way, but here he ate it normally, and was pleased to discover that he could still do so with no trouble. The consciousness within him twitched excitedly whenever he took a spoonful of rice to his mouth, but he told it strongly to calm down and for the most part it complied.

What little conversation there was occurred between Hinata and Kurenai. Hinata had began the meal rather quickly, shovelling food to her mouth at a near-Kiba rate, but then evidently remembered something and started to eat smaller portions; what the cause of this change was, Shino had no idea. Kurenai ate refinedly but very efficiently, which Shino found impressive (although he tried not to stare). Kiba was the first to finish eating, and he now sat facing Shino in a contemplative position. Leaning back and with his feet off the floor, Kiba stroked his chin with one hand and patted Akamaru with the other, carefully watching the Aburame like he was a puzzle to be solved.

"We have a mission tomorrow," Kurenai said. "And it's not chasing cats or cleaning gardens."

The three genin stopped eating and sat up.

"It's a C-rank mission," she said. "There's a small settlement to the South of Konoha called Hisui Village. They were founded on the mining of jade for jewellery, but now they manufacture kunai for us. We haven't had a shipment from them this month, and they haven't sent anyone to explain why."

"So, we're there to fix what's wrong?" asked Kiba.

"More or less," said Kurenai. "We're heading out tomorrow, nine AM. All of you pack light, then we'll meet at the village gate."

"H-how light?" asked Hinata.

"We should be gone for about eight days' round trip," said Kurenai.

_Then why pack anything at all?_ thought Kiba.

Hinata stayed quiet, but was extremely excited. She'd never left Konoha in her entire life, not even for a moment, and tomorrow she was going somewhere four days away. Pacing mouthfuls, she wondered if they'd see any bandits out in Hisui.

Kurenai waited until Hinata finished, then said:

"Hinata, can I talk to you outside?" asked Kurenai.

_I wonder what this is about?_

"Y-yes, Kurenai-sensei," said Hinata.

They both got up and left the table, Shino now feeling more trapped than ever. He looked to Kurenai with a hint of a pleading expression, but she just shook her head quietly and walked out, Hinata following.

Kiba looked to make sure they were gone, then finally left the contemplative pose. Leaning forward, he gave the impression of a great scientist or mathematician testing a formula as he carefully regarded Shino and spoke.

"So," said Kiba. "…how's things?"

Shino stared at him.

"You know," said Kiba, "you seem...on edge sometimes. Just wonderin' what's been happening when we don't see each other."

Shino stared at him.

Kiba shuffled in his seat, and stared back at Shino in response. There they sat for about a minute, two ninja locked together in the epic staring contest that would determine the fate of the conversation, until Shino realised how stupid this was and looked away. Kiba followed his gaze, but nothing came of it.

"Hn," Shino muttered.

It was now Kiba's turn to frown in confusion, looking at Shino as if he had gone mad. Shino tried to ignore this and keep eating, but the intensity of Kiba's confusion meant it became increasingly hard to avoid. Finally, he snapped:

"_What_?"

"You just said 'Hn'," said Kiba, a touch accusatively.

"...yes?"

Kiba sat back.

"Why?"

Shino marvelled at Kiba's immense lack of intelligence, and responded slowly:

"I was contemplating something."

Kiba mulled this over for a minute, then suddenly started laughing. Shino stared at him in response, and wondered when Kurenai and Hinata were getting back – _them_ he could deal with. Finally the short boy stopped laughing, and he said:

"Dude, it's '**hmm'**."

He took a swig of his drink and further elaborated: "M, not n."

"Don't call me that," said Shino.

"What?" asked Kiba. "'Dude'?"

Kiba took Shino's silence as a response, and shrugged.

"I call everyone that."

Shino frowned at him.

"I'm not everyone," he said.

"Well, I'm not givin' you special treatment," said Kiba.

_Wait, yeah I am_, Kiba thought_. But he totally doesn't know that!_

Grinning happily at his secret, Kiba threw a few coins onto the table and left it, walking out of the restaurant to the others. Shino shook his head, let an annoyed sigh escape his lips, then reluctantly followed him.

00000

Outside, Kurenai faced Hinata, a little way away from the front door of the restaurant.

"Hinata," she said, "I don't think you're eating enough."

Hinata stared back in confusion.

"...I'm...sorry?"

Kurenai couldn't help but think this was a typical Hinata response, but pressed on:

"You seemed a lot keener at the start of lunch than the end of it. We're not going to judge you for eating more, Hinata."

Doubt flashed across Hinata's face as she thought of her clan's ideals. Hyuga women (and, by either design or coincidence, Hyuga men) were meant to be tall, thin and willowy, possessing a kind of grace that Hinata knew full well she didn't have.

"Hinata, the tasks of a kunoichi burn off more fat than any other occupation. If you don't eat enough, you run the risk of running out of chakra or just getting too tired at a critical moment that could lose you the mission."

Hinata thought that this didn't explain why Kurenai-sensei was so tall and thin. But the eyes of her teacher were somehow very convincing.

"Please, just eat enough."

"…yes, Kurenai-sensei."

00000

Kegawa Inuzuka looked cautiously out the window of the carriage as it made its way towards Konoha. He didn't much care for wheeled travel. It was ungainly, you barely got any sunshine and worst of all, basically only the widest roads could be travelled on. He wondered why the feudal lord couldn't have made his daughter walk, or ride a horse, or an ox, or a sheep, or something other than this ridiculous mode of transport. Anyone who insisted on being this coddled was not at all ready for ninja life.

He was happy, then, that Lady Hikari didn't seem to be coddled at all. He'd seen her look out the window almost as much as he had, although in her case it was curiosity rather than his old-fashioned ninja paranoia. She definitely had a mild look about her, but he saw in her green eyes a certain boldness, or hardness. (Or _something_. He wasn't a damn poet, after all.)

He stared out at the Land of Fire, and cautiously smiled. His clan never tired of pointing out that he was the first Inuzuka to be born in Konoha, so maybe that was why he felt such a connection to the land. Then again, his clan might have been running their mouths off as usual. That was an Inuzuka trait he was glad he hadn't inherited, although his daughter Tsume...

"Kegawa-san?"

Kegawa looked to his charge.

"Yes, Lady Hikari?"

"Those trees are losing their leaves, but it's spring. How does that make sense?"

Kegawa chuckled.

"That's just one of the mysteries of life," he said. "Trees in the Land of Fire drop leaves all day, every day, for the entire year. How do they have so many leaves? I have no idea. They just do."

"Maybe it's a disease," suggested Akane, the girl of the squad.

"Don't say that!" said Ando, the dead-last of the squad. "The Land of Fire's falling leaves are a perfect symbol of our great heritage!"

"Well, maybe it's a _good_ disease."

"How can you have a good disease?"

Kegawa shook his head in exhaustion. Ando and Akane would pretty much argue about anything, ninja-related or not. He didn't bother to stop them because their arguments inevitably blew over as fast as they started, but he wished they'd give it a rest, particularly this close to the village. He just prayed Hikari thought most Konoha ninja were like Tosuda, who was at least _quiet_, instead of those two.

As he saw Kegawa-sensei looked back out the window, Tosuda put his left shin up onto his right leg and pulled out his kunai. He then pushed it to his metal shin guard and carved a deep, straight scratch into it, alongside several other such scratches.

"Aren't those meant to be for confirmed kills?" asked Hikari.

Tosuda looked momentarily taken aback that a rather pretty girly-girl knew so much about military stuff, but he then answered:

"Yeah, normally. For me, they're for Ando-Akane arguments. I figure hearing yet _another_ lover's spat is way worse than fighting enemy ninja."

Hikari laughed, but Kegawa's stern gaze at Tosuda made the boy put away his kunai. Kegawa was a veteran of the Second Great Shinobi War, and he had forgotten it was best not to remind him of it.

"Don't be so familiar, Tosuda," he reprimanded.

"Yes, Kegawa-sensei," Tosuda responded.

The carriage stopped in front of Konoha's gates, and Kegawa was mercifully allowed out. His squad waited to the side with Hikari while he went directly to the open gate and looked for someone.

He sniffed, and spied a blond boy running through the streets.

"Hey!" he shouted. "Come here!"

The boy ran over to the gates.

"Yes, Kegawa-san?"

"Run and tell Lord Hokage that Lady Hikari has arrived."

If the boy had been surprised that a girl only three or so years older than him was important enough to be called a Lady, then it was extremely obvious that that was the case, because his previously calm face was now marred by puzzlement. Nonetheless, he nodded.

"Yes, Kegawa-san!"

The boy nodded and ran off.

"Children are so well-behaved here," said Hikari.

"No, Lady Hikari," said Kegawa, "they're snot-nosed brats like everywhere else. That one's the exception. Apparently, he's a genius."

"How do you know?" asked Hikari.

"My Tsume's always complaining about him. They say he'll graduate from the Academy soon, even."

"What's his name?"

Ando stopped squabbling with Akane briefly and said:

"His name's Minato Namikaze! And he's gonna be Hokage someday! He told me about it!"

Akane took advantage of his distracted nature to hit him.

"She didn't ask you, stupid!"

"I'm not stupid! _You're_ stupid!"

Their fight resumed, Ando and Akane once again became of no use to Kegawa beyond the most basic of duties.

"You three take Lady Hikari's luggage to the Hyuga compound," he said, gesturing to them and Tosuda. "Be careful with it. Tell the Hyuga she'll be along soon."

Hikari seemed confused.

"We're not going to the Hyuga compound?"

"No," said Kegawa. "You can meet the Hokage first. Damn nest of vipers…"

His muttering did little to ease Hikari's nervousness. Nonetheless, she followed Kegawa into the village. She noticed that it was mostly empty of people, civilian or ninja; she wondered if the streets had been cleared so as to avoid a scene when she showed up. Her footsteps echoed in time as she walked with Kegawa. She felt an urge to hold his hand, but quelled it as soon as she could. Kegawa was fatherly, but he wasn't her father. Her parents were a long way away, and she'd already said her goodbyes to them.

_Don't think about that_, she thought. _Think of the future, Hikari._

She was led up a flight of stairs to a large, earth-coloured building that looked very old. From the foyer that she saw she guessed that this was the main organisational building of the village. At first she had assumed that the giant stone faces that she had seen before were the town centre, but then realised that would have been sort of tacky. Kegawa led her up more stairs, then through a warren-like series of tunnels, and finally to a large room with only a few people in it.

The oldest was a middle-aged man with a kindly face and brown hair, wearing a very large hat and long white robes.

"Welcome to Konoha, Lady Hikari," said the brown-haired man. "I am Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage. Was your trip comfortable?"

_Unfortunately_, thought Kegawa.

"Yes, thankyou, Lord Hokage," said Hikari.

From behind a pillar, three men appeared. They all had pale skin and the same purple, pupil-less eyes. Their expressions were all proud, but they didn't look like the nobles Hikari was used to. These were obviously higher-class ninja.

"Good afternoon, Lady Hikari," said the tallest. "I am Higashi, leader of the Hyuga clan. These are my sons."

Hikari looked down at the two shorter Hyuga. Both were wearing matching headbands, but apart from that there was no difference between them. She remembered her father's words - "You only get one chance to make a first impression" – and decided to make it count.

"Twins," she commented. "_Nice_."

Within seconds, Hikari knew very well that she had made it count indeed. Higashi's eyes narrowed and his mouth grew thin; he also looked like he would have folded his arms if he were less stoic. Sarutobi seemed to sigh silently, as if thinking "Ooh boy, _another_ one". Chancing a look at Kegawa, Hikari saw the jonin try desperately to avoid smiling, and felt very proud of her achievement.

The last test, however, was the twins themselves. One mirrored his father's look almost exactly. The other looked nearly as poker-faced as his brother, but Hikari could tell his was biting his cheeks to avoid laughing. She hoped that that was Hiashi, because if she had to marry a Hyuga, she would have preferred that one. At least he seemed to find her joke funny.

The stoic brother stepped forward.

"I am Hiashi," he said.

_Dammit_, thought Hikari.

00000

The sun was low enough in the sky to cast wide shadows over Squad Eight as they waited outside the Hokage Building. Their day of missions was over, the long series of weeding, cleaning and in one case babysitting was complete. Kurenai had left them ten or so minutes ago to get leave-passes so they could go on the mission tomorrow. After a long day, and with tensions between Shino and Kiba obvious, it had been a long wait.

"Why'd'you think she's taking so long?" asked Kiba, slouched against a wall.

Shino said nothing. He had been even more quiet than usual since lunch, only communicating in nods and single words. Kiba's few attempts to get him to be more sociable had failed, so he had given Shino up as a lost cause for that day at least. He instead resolved to think more tactically about the whole thing, and persuade him to open up on the mission itself. After four days, he'd have to talk to _someone_.

"K-Kurenai-sensei is probably just busy," said Hinata. "We can wait for a few more minutes."

Kiba stood.

"We've waited long enough," he said. "I'm going inside."

"N-no, don't!"

Kiba and Shino looked at Hinata, who had stood up herself.

"I…I'll f-find her."

_Great,_ thought Kiba, _five more minutes of nothing but 'hn'._

Kiba sat down and nodded slightly to Hinata, who turned and left them.

Inside the Hokage building, Kurenai breathed a sigh of relief as she finally found the right room. She hadn't been a jonin for long, but in her years as a chunin she'd spent a lot of time wandering around the labyrinthine building, trying to find one place or another. It didn't help that there were multiple floors, or that the architect had designed the building to be difficult to navigate on purpose. The loss in efficiency was made up for by the fact that enemy ninja would have had a very hard time working out where everything was.

Opening the door, Kurenai was surprised but happy to find a familiar face: Asuma. They'd been seeing each other for a while now, but although they'd kept it quiet where possible, she got the feeling that they were still too obvious about their relationship.

"Hey," said Asuma, his customary cigarette dangling from his lip, unlit.

"Hey," said Kurenai. "Where's your squad?"

"Went home," said Asuma. "Where's yours?"

"Outside," said Kurenai.

He smiled at her.

"How long did it take you to get here?"

Kurenai frowned.

"I am _not_ the only one to get lost around here. I've seen Kakashi wander around here for an entire day."

"Yeah," said Asuma, "but Kakashi is sometimes...lost on the road of life."

Kurenai shrugged.

"The three of them can wait a few more minutes," she said.

"That's not very professional," commented Asuma.

"And the rest of the jonin-sensei are?"

"Unyielding in the line of duty to Konoha," he replied.

"Oh, yeah," said Kurenai. "Gai is…Gai, Kakashi reads those porn books, and you smoke cigarettes on duty. What exactly is your definition of professional?"

"You forgot Yoru," commented Asuma.

Kurenai frowned and shook her head. Asuma stepped closer to her, and put a hand on her arm.

"But," he said, "if I didn't smoke, how would I get such a sexy voice?"

"Or terrible breath?" asked Kurenai as he pulled her in.

"And yet you keep kissing me," said Asuma.

A second or so later, they proved Asuma's point. Were they paying attention to anything else, they would have noticed footsteps and a door opening, but their distraction was forgivable, given the circumstances.

"Kurenai-sensei-" began Hinata.

She then rapidly processed what she was seeing, and quickly squeaked out:

"I-I'm s-s-sorry!"

The door slammed shut as the embarrassed-looking jonin looked back at the door.

"...I should-"

"Yes," said Kurenai. "Bye."

She quickly collected the leave-passes and left before Asuma, finding Hinata waiting outside the room, to the right of the door. Kurenai noticed that Hinata looked more embarrassed than her or Asuma, her skin even paler than usual and her index fingers touching nervously.

"Hinata," she said. "How...did you get here so fast?"

"B-byakugan," said Hinata.

_Makes sense_, thought Kurenai.

Now that Hinata was with her, the trip back to the exit was much faster than the way there, although substantially more awkward. They reached Kiba and Shino within a minute, both sitting down and neither speaking to one another.

"Here are your leave-passes," said Kurenai. "Remember to bring them; they're very important. We'll meet here again, nine AM. Any questions?"

Shino raised a hand.

"You...don't have to hold up your hand, Shino," said Kurenai.

Shino lowered his hand.

"Kurenai-sensei," he said, "did you select today's missions for us to specifically develop our reconnaissance skills as a team?"

Kurenai paused.

"...yes," she claimed.

_Well, Hinata certainly found out something..._

"Hn," said Shino.

"Are you implying something?" asked Kurenai.

"Aburame do not imply," said Shino, and he got up and left.

Kurenai threw a questioning look at Kiba, who frowned and shook his head.

"Well, that's it for today, then," she said. "Goodbye, Kiba. Hinata."

"Goodbye, sensei," they said.

The children walked away from the Hokage building and into the calm afternoon, the streets of Konoha rustling with the ever-falling leaves.

"Hinata," said Kiba, "can you tell me about...you?"

"M-me?" asked Hinata.

"Yeah," said Kiba. "I mean, I talk all day. You probably already know enough about me."

"N-no I don't," said Hinata. "You didn't finish your story about your clan."

_And I can't figure out why you'd be the clan heir first..._

Kiba waved a hand.

"Doesn't matter," he said. "So...you."

"Me," said Hinata. "Um...I...like cinnamon."

"Okay," said Kiba, "cinnamon, good."

"And...training," said Hinata.

Kiba nodded.

_I'm doing this all __**wrong**_, thought Hinata. _Nobody ever asks me this!_

"And...w-well, you kn-know who I like," said Hinata.

"Yeah," said Kiba.

_Something interesting...something he wouldn't think, something...something..._

"What taijutsu do you use?"

Hinata stopped dead in her tracks.

"...s-sorry?"

"What taijutsu do you use?" asked Kiba. "Because I've seen you fight before, but not really like anyone else."

Hinata took a breath in, and prepared for the humiliation.

"U-um...w-well, I...I st-...still...u-use Whirling L-leaf."

Kiba frowned.

"No _way_."

"Hmm?"

"The way you fight's not like Whirling Leaf," he said. "When I use Whirling Leaf, I don't fight like you do. Like you did in taijutsu class, I mean."

"Well, you've s-specialised," said Hinata.

She sighed.

"Like I'm _meant_ to."

"Meant to what?" asked Kiba.

"I c-can't learn Gentle Fist," said Hinata. "I've trained in it for most of my life, but...I can't do it."

"Is that your clan's taijutsu?" asked Kiba.

She nodded.

"Th-they put me on this team because...b-because I'm meant to be a close-quarters specialist. B-but all I can do is Whirling Leaf..."

She blinked to get rid of tears.

"...and I'm not the clan heiress anymore."

"Hinata..."

She waited for him to tell him how weak she was.

"...that is _brilliant_," he said.

She looked up.

"Wh-what?...I mean, s-"

"Don't apologise!" said Kiba. "...as much as you do now! You should still apologise sometimes, but not now, because that is great!"

"K-kiba, how is being a failure great?"

"Because you're not a failure," said Kiba. "You're just not what _they_ want. Whoever tried to make you into the clan heiress, they're trying to put you somewhere you don't fit. If you fight better with Whirling Leaf, then you should use it, because if you're good enough – and I _know_ you are – you'll be a great close-quarters fighter anyway."

Hinata's gaze moved from the ground, to the defiant face of Kiba, to the lone blue patch in the grey sky above.

"Y-you're good at this, Kiba," she said. "C-convincing failures, I mean."

"Yeah," said Kiba.

He laughed.

"I tell myself stuff like that all the time," he said.

He mused on this for a moment, then seemingly had an idea.

"Hinata," he said, "you've never had a brother, have you?"

Hinata's mind went to Neji, but then rejected it. He didn't exactly act brotherly.

"N-no," she said. "b-but neither have you."

"Well, that's exactly my point! Exactly! If I had a brother, I...well...I think I'd be better off, yeah? 'Cos if I had a little brother, I could teach him how to do stuff, and if I hada big brother he could teach me."

"Y-you have a sister though," said Hinata.

"Yeah," said Kiba. "But I'm gonna teach you anyway!"

"Wh-what?" asked Hinata.

"I'll be like your big brother, Hinata!"

He pointed straight at her.

"Call me Kiba-niisan!"

There was a silence.

"...I'm not calling you that," said Hinata.

"Aw, man!" said Kiba. "C'mon, Hinata! _Pleeease_?"

"N-no," said Hinata, crossing her arms.

"Okay," said Kiba, "but...I mean it, Hinata."

He looked like he did. He looked strong-willed, powerful, even though he had a small dog on top of his head.

"...thankyou, Kiba," she said.

"...-niisan?" Kiba prompted.

Hinata shook her head, and Kiba accepted it.

_So,_ thought Hinata, _I've made a brother._

Here they parted in silence, but a happy silence. Hinata turned onto the main road, that long, wide way to the outside of the village, and smiled at the idea that tomorrow, she would walk through the great village gate, and into the green unknown.

Suddenly, she heard a mewling noise. Activating the byakugan, she saw the origin a few metres away, under a house: a small kitten, splotched with black and white.

_The missing kitten!_ she thought, and scrambled towards it.

This time, however, her feline prey was much more docile. It happily came to Hinata when called, and curiously sniffed at her fingers, squeaking like a gate that needed oiling. She picked it up in one hand.

"H-hi, kitty," she said. "Y-you're cute."

It mooched on her jacket in response, leaving fur.

Out of her peripheral vision, much expanded by the Byakugan, she saw the approach of Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke, as well as two other men. She considered slipping away now, but they were very close, and she could at least wish them good luck, wherever they were going.

She stepped out into the open and deactivated the Byakugan. Sakura, Naruto and the older of the two men looked surprised; clearly she'd been hiding well. Sasuke didn't seem so shocked, though, so he'd probably seen her before anyone else.

Their grey-haired sensei, though, seemed familiar to her. She'd definitely seen him before, and had perhaps even spoken to him, but his name escaped her.

"G-good afternoon," she said.

"Hi Hinata!" said Naruto. "You have a cat!"

Hinata looked down at the kitten in her arms.

"Y-yes," she said.

"Cool!" said Naruto, giving the thumbs up.

Sakura rolled her eyes at him, glanced and smiled at the kitten for a brief moment, then went back to staring at Sasuke as if he was the most interesting man in the world. Sasuke nodded briefly at Hinata then ignored the kitten, perhaps feeling it would break his desperate need to concentrate very hard on a featureless point in the distance. Kakashi tilted his head questioningly at the kitten. The jonin did not openly acknowledge Hinata's presence, but the brief eye contact between them was all either ninja needed.

_Oh_, she thought, _him._

Suddenly looking nervous, Naruto stepped forward.

"Well," said Kakashi, "we're late already, so-"

"Uh…Hinata?"

Hinata looked up at Naruto, now closer to her than before.

"Y-yes?"

"I always…"

His face screwed up in concentration.

_How can I say this without comin' off all weird?_

"…see, I've seen you look at me before," he began. "Like, a lot. And first I was like 'wow, that's weird', but then I realised why!"

Hinata's eyes widened and her heartbeat rose. Had he finally worked it out? People had always said that Naruto was not exactly smart, but had he realised just how often Hinata looked at him and put two and two together?

She tightened her arms around her, then loosened them again when the kitten meowed in complaint. She breathed in, too terrified that she'd ruin the moment if she did anything else. She stared into Naruto's eyes, and waited.

_Hmm,_ thought Kakashi. _I didn't figure Naruto for a romantic._

"You like my goggles, don'tcha?" said Naruto in a slightly teasing voice.

Hinata's jaw almost fell open.

"Wh-what?"

Kakashi quietly rolled his eyes in the background.

_I figured right the first time, then._

"Yeah," he said happily, "they're pretty cool. I don't blame you for staring at 'em. I figured you'd just get some yourself, but you never did, so then I thought maybe you couldn't find any? They're pretty rare, this brand. So, uh, I know we're not gonna see each other for a while, so I thought I'd give you them!"

She blinked, but he seemed to be serious.

"R-really?"

"Mm-hm!" he nodded, and he pulled the goggles out of his bag. "Now I wear a headband, so I don't wear 'em much anymore. But since you seem to like them, you can have them now!"

"You're giving her your garbage?" asked Sasuke from the background.

"What?"

The young shinobi about-faced in rage.

"No way! These aren't garbage! They're awesome!"

"Whatever," said Sasuke dismissively, mutterings of 'loser' probably playing on his tongue.

Naruto turned back to Hinata.

"So anyway, you can wear them when you're not on missions if you want."

He then looked closer.

"Hey, actually, you could wear them on missions anyway, 'cos you wear your headband on your neck."

Surprised he'd noticed (and that he was looking at her neck), she managed to stammer out: "Th-thankyou, Naruto."

"That's okay!" he said.

Passing her the goggles, Naruto missed the nervous look on Hinata's face, the fact that her blush grew even redder as their hands brushed together when she took the goggles, and the sight of his squadmates and Tazuna shaking their heads in abject astonishment at how catastrophically clueless he was.

Slowly, Hinata turned around as she held the goggles in her left hand, wondering if she'd stumbled into a dream by accident.

_No, it can't be_, she thought. _If I were dreaming, he would have actually noticed how in love I am with him._

…_but, maybe it's one of those strange dreams I have sometimes?_

"Hey, wait!"

Hinata turned back to see Naruto, and was relieved to note that he had not turned into a purple giraffe or something in the intervening time since she'd seen him last.

"Hm?"

Naruto stepped even closer to her, which didn't do wonders for her concentration, but nonetheless she managed to listen to most of what Naruto said pretty clearly.

"See," said Naruto, "a lot of people are mean to you, Hinata. A lot of people are mean to me, and they said I'd never be a ninja. But now I'm going on a real mission, so…"

He scratched his head, but kept his eyes open.

"…whatever you do, don't listen to them. You're not weak. Don't let anyone tell you that, 'cos they're just jealous they're not as nice as you are, and you're way better than them."

She stared back at him – shocked, disappointed, yet still feeling a sense of completeness.

And then the moment passed. Naruto Uzumaki stopped looking at her, turned around, and rejoined his squad.

"If we're done with distractions," said Sasuke as he began to walk.

Naruto glared at him, and Sakura gave the Uchiha a pained look.

_How can anyone so cute be so mean?_ she thought.

"That was kind of you, Naruto," commented Kakashi.

"Yeah, she seemed to like 'em," said Naruto. "Maybe I should give her more of my things."

The other members of Squad Seven exchanged sideways glances. Not noticing, Naruto continued:

"I thought I should give her a pep talk," explained Naruto. "Hinata gets a lot of jerks pushin' her around. When I was a kid, somebody told me I should be happy I'm not like everyone else. And I think Hinata should be like that too."

The blond genin frowned in concentration, and said:

"'Cept I can't remember _who_ it was that told me that…"

* * *

Thanks for reading, patient ones! Please review, if you feel inclined to humour this perenially-late man.


	6. First Mission: The Village of Jade!

Hello again. Readers, today marks an important day for me. It is the day that I actually updated _The Sun Kunoichi_. Also, some English people got married, I guess.

00000

Chapter 6:

First Mission: The Village of Jade!

Orora Hyuga rapped his knuckles on the door, three times in succession. He stood a few floors up from the ground, in the doorway of Anko Mitarashi's apartment. It was a threadbare block, all grey and faded white. The trees around the apartments seemed to be allowed to grow where they wished, only being pruned back messily when they obstructed passage through the outer halls. Below and behind him was an open space where washing lines criss-crossed above a thin courtyard of grass. He was cold, but not shivering; extensive training as one of Lord Hiashi's top advisors meant that he knew how to remain very, very still.

The door opened, and a face peered out, an inquisitive look in Anko Mitarashi's eyes. Orora had heard other men say Anko Mitarashi was attractive, although he didn't particularly think so. She neither acted nor looked feminine enough for the standards of the Hyuga clan. True, she was still young, and a diamond only just mined out of the ground needed cutting before it could truly shine, but Orora didn't think Anko was that kind of diamond. She was more of an industrial-grade diamond; dull, but unbreakable.

"Yeah, what?" she said.

Orora realised the diamond metaphor didn't really work, because Anko was definitely something diamonds were usually not: blunt.

"Are you Anko Mitarashi?" asked Orora, making sure to confirm it.

"Yeah," she said. "You're a Hyuga."

"Obviously," he said.

He saw her mutter a brief invective at him, but elected to ignore it, mostly because he wasn't familiar with what that particular act entailed.

"I am searching for Hinata Hyuga," he said. "I have heard that you are a friend of hers."

"You heard right," she confirmed, leaning on the doorframe, "but they're not here."

"'They're'?"

Anko shrugged.

"…well, she'd be with her squad."

"Then Shino Aburame and the Inuzuka were with her," he concluded.

"Yeah," said Anko. "Scuttlebutt seems to be they work together pretty well, actually."

Orora sniffed dismissively.

"They have insulted Lord Hiashi," he said. "So has Hinata."

"Aww!" said Anko, disappointed. "I missed Lord Hiashi getting his ass kicked, verbally, by twelve year olds? Some days I just have no luck at all."

"Indeed," said Orora, thin-lipped.

"Well," said Anko, "good luck findin' them."

She folded her arms.

"You may be lying," Orora opined. "I could use the Byakugan to check if they were in your…"

He searched for the right word for what he could see of the chaotic mess behind Anko.

"...house," he concluded.

Anko snorted.

"Yeah," she said, "bet you'd love to use the Byakugan on me, wouldn't you?"

Orora rolled his eyes.

_They __**always**__ make those jokes_, he thought. _Why do they __**all**__ immediately think of that?_

"No thankyou," he said curtly. "You are hardly my type."

"A woman?" asked Anko.

Orora thought for a moment, squinted carefully at Anko for a few moments, and then stood upright again.

"Oh," he said, "you _are_ female."

"Yeah," said Anko. "See, outside the Hyuga compound, we can tell the difference between genders."

The Hyuga had no comeback to that.

"This will be discussed with Lady Tsume and Lord Shibi," he said.

With this, he turned and walked away.

Anko waited until he'd left the apartment block before going back in, shutting and locking the door behind her. Stepping forward and over the pile of dirty clothes she'd kicked to the side of the room so Hinata and her squadmates could get through, she stood on the threshold of the open doorway into the kitchen, the living room not far beyond.

Hinata, Kiba and Shino were in the living room, all sitting. Kiba was leaning on a wall and petting Akamaru, who wagged his tail rapidly but otherwise remained still. Shino sat on the floor, legs together and to the side. Anko guessed he didn't have the flexibility to sit cross-legged; Aburame usually depended more on jutsu than physical skill. Hinata sat on Anko's couch, her knees up to her chin.

Shino spoke.

"Why do you sit like that?" he asked Hinata.

"It feels c-comfortable," she responded.

He frowned. It didn't seem very ergonomic, really.

"So..." Kiba began. "Are we...safe now?"

"S-_sort_ of," said Hinata. "The Hyuga who just came looking f-for us is called Orora. I think I can trust him."

"Really?" asked Kiba. "Forgive me for bein' sceptical, but apart from you, I haven't actually met a Hyuga yet who I'd trust."

"Why?" asked Shino.

"'Cos they're assholes," said Kiba, conclusively.

"Kind disposition is not necessarily a sign of trustworthiness," said Shino.

Kiba stared at him blankly.

"The best example is Sasuke Uchiha," said Shino. "I dislike him immensely, but if it were vitally important, I would trust him immediately, because I know he is competent."

Hinata suddenly looked curious.

"Y-you don't like Sasuke?" she asked.

"No," said Shino.

"Weird," said Kiba. "I thought a pair of reclusive geniuses'd get on really well."

"Hnn," said Shino.

Kiba laughed.

_Or, maybe they're both too reclusive,_ he thought.

"He wouldn't be allowed to Byakugan the house to look for you guys anyway," said Anko, walking in.

"Why not?" asked Kiba.

"It'd be illegal," Anko said, sitting down next to Hinata. "When they're actually inside Konoha, Hyuga are only allowed to use the Byakugan within their compound or when they're training."

"Huh," said Kiba. "But if everyone can use the Byakugan in the Hyuga compound, how do you stop everybody from seeing everything?"

His eyes looked from Anko to Hinata, both of whom now looked awkward.

"Th-there is a way," said Hinata. "But...I'm s-sorry, I can't tell you about it."

"The less Hinata can tell us about the Hyuga, the better," said Shino. "Then we'll have a stronger defence if Lord Hiashi takes our case to the Hokage."

"Case?" asked Kiba. "This is a case now?"

"It may soon be," said Shino.

Hinata was suddenly struck again by the gravity of what had just happened. She'd done enough on the day she'd left for Hisui Village, but what she'd said to her father barely an hour ago was grounds for serious punishment. Not serious enough for expulsion from the clan, though.

Hopefully.

"If they do take it to the Hokage, we'll win," said Anko. "We could make a pretty good case that the Hyuga've gone way past reasonable training methods."

"R-reasonable training methods?"

"A set of standards regarding what a ninja acting in a training capacity is permitted to do," said Shino. "They are...loosely defined."

"I'd call 'em more guidelines than standards," said Anko, pulling a small drink can from the side of the couch and opening it. "You can appeal to the Hokage if you think your teachers've gone too far, but don't use it all the time, or they'll just think you're crying wolf and ignore you."

Anko drank from the can. Kiba sniffed the air and frowned, and Hinata looked at the label, then to Anko, then to the label again.

"A-anko-neesan," she said, "is that…beer?"

Anko abruptly stopped drinking, can still to her lips, and looked down.

"Mmhm," she said.

_I'm drinking beer in front of twelve-year olds. I reaaaally hope they don't tell anyone. _

She put the can down.

"All of you shut your eyes until I say to open them!" she said in a slightly harsher tone, although nowhere near as rough as she used when ordering other chunin around.

The three children did so. This taken care of, Anko took a deep breath, then skulled the beer as fast as she could, looking around to check that nobody was looking in at her through the windows. This done, she crushed the can on the front of her head (a skill she was disproportionately proud of) and threw it at the bin. It missed by about a foot.

_Close enough,_ she shrugged.

"Okay, you can open 'em again," she said.

The three did so. Kiba grinned at this.

_I guess this isn't so bad_, he thought.

00000

_Four Days Before…_

Hinata slipped out from her bathroom, slightly groggy but fully dressed, and looked to the floor for her backpack. She had packed it the previous night before dinner and put it at the foot of her bed, ready to slip away as soon as she got up. Peeking out the window, she was surprised to see how much lighter it had gotten since she'd been woken up by the buzzing of her alarm, but was relieved that it was still fairly dark.

Glancing at her room, Hinata considered cleaning it one more time in case one of the other Hyuga looked through it. She had no proof that that had ever happened, but she wanted to be careful. It would have been very dangerous for her to have any evidence of her private hobbies or her contact with Anko lying around, so everything was very carefully hidden, inside book-spines and behind floorboards and in all sorts of places. The clan could send somebody to spy on her if they really wanted to know more about her personal life, but the upside of being thought so little of was that she almost always escaped notice.

Hiding her things wouldn't be any use against the Byakugan, but Hinata knew very well at least one of the unspoken rules of the Hyuga. Outside of training, nobody used the Byakugan on each other. Unlike every other Hyuga rule, though, it was one that Hinata knew was not very highly enforced and could easily be broken.

Deciding the rest of her room was clean enough, Hinata looked down at her bed, pulled the top sheets off of it, and looked at the mattress very, very carefully. This was the most important hiding place in her room. It contained most of the birthday presents Anko had given Hinata over the years, small things that she had bought herself, and the most incriminating objects of all: Naruto's goggles. If a Hyuga saw any of the things under her mattress, Hinata would not be able to explain them away like she could with her _Real Ninja Stories_ magazines (which she had cut into clippings and hidden in an old kunai-box on the highest shelf in her room).

Anko's presents weren't the problem, though; they were mostly small, or pictures, and so could be hidden in the lining of the mattress fairly easily. It was the goggles. They fit in the lining as well once Hinata had cut a slightly bigger hole in the bottom of the mattress, yet she still looked over her mattress carefully, wondering if it looked uneven.

_I suppose I can leave them here_, she eventually decided. _I don't think they'll replace my mattress when I'm away, anyway._

Her mind still tense but a little more relaxed than before, she put the sheets back onto her mattress as neatly as she could and picked up her bag. Sandals on, Hinata opened her door and walked softly out into the hallway. Here, she crept forward, passing other doors, until she reached a staircase and walked down it, quickly and quietly as possible. Turning around to go across the next floor, Hinata walked a few more steps before abruptly running into someone.

Her heartbeat raced for a brief second, but then it slowed back down to normal speed when she realised it was Hanabi, her little sister. Hanabi was eight years old and very talented in jutsu. The role of clan heir had defaulted to Hanabi when the Hyuga clan council had taken it from Hinata. Hanabi was young, but Hinata knew her sister was handling the duties required of the next Hyuga leader far better than she ever had.

"Good morning, Hinata," said Hanabi; not shouting, but still slightly too loud for Hinata's purposes.

Hinata pushed her index fingers together nervously.

"H...hello, Hanabi," she responded.

She suddenly realised she was crouching slightly, and had been doing so since she'd left her room.

"Are you trying to sneak out of the house?" asked Hanabi.

Hinata could not help but think that if that question needed to be asked, she was not sneaking particularly well.

"Mm-hmm," she said.

"It would probably work better if you just walked normally and looked important, neesan," said Hanabi evenly.

Hinata nodded slightly.

"Th-thankyou, Hanabi."

Hanabi smiled and bowed before Hinata, then walked past her sister and up the stairs behind her. Breathing a quiet sigh of relief, Hinata pushed on, walking normally this time and trying to look important.

_But usually I don't look important_, she thought. _I sort of hide in the crowd. So...would people suspect me less if I acted like how I normally do_?

She had been pondering this question for quite some time when Hinata passed an office door and heard her father speaking inside of it. It wasn't her father's office – that was deep inside the compound, whereas this was overlooking the grounds – but she was sure she heard him in there. Abruptly, she stopped before the doorway.

She almost walked on. She knew it would have been better if she had. She could go on saying to herself that the next time she spoke with her father, she'd impress him, somehow. If she could keep telling herself that, and if she could believe it, she'd never be disappointed by how he saw her as a failure. But she really didn't believe it, so instead she stayed outside the office door, and listened.

"And Hinata?" she heard her father ask.

"She has demonstrated no great improvement, Lord Hiashi. She is on a team with the Inuzuka boy and an Aburame."

The voice belonged to Orora Hyuga, one of Hiashi's advisors. Hinata listened closer, but heard nothing; she presumed her father was mulling this information over.

"If her results so far are correct, she will not be able to keep up with them," he said.

Hinata felt a rising bitter taste in her throat, and pushed a fingernail hard into her palm to stop herself from crying. She knew Hiashi thought this. _Everybody_ in her clan thought this. She was the failure of the Hyuga, a point obvious to anyone. She just hadn't heard it in a while.

Concentrating on the pain in her left hand as the fingernail dug into it, Hinata blinked quickly and listened when Orora spoke again.

"What about what Kurenai Yuhi said, Lord Hiashi?"

Hinata looked up. Kurenai had spoken with her father? She hadn't known that. And if Orora was bringing it up, then she'd probably said something important, something positive about her. How much was her sensei looking after her, even when she wasn't training?

She breathed in again, and closed her eyes to listen better.

Hiashi answered:

"Her confidence is misplaced. Training Hinata is no longer a priority. She..."

She opened her eyes again.

"Lord Hiashi?"

"...it was a waste of time from the start," he finished.

Hinata breathed out again. She tried to stop herself from crying, but she suddenly felt too numb to move, standing beside the closed door. It began to slide open, and she realised she should have stepped out of the way, but she could only stare at the ground, the entire conversation echoing through her mind.

_Waste of time_, she thought.

Orora appeared and looked at her for a moment, then subtly gestured for her to come inside. Having a good idea of what would be in store for her, she walked past him through the door, facing her father.

The office was empty of anything besides a desk to the side of the room, obviously a place that wasn't used much by anybody. Hiashi stood before a large closed window, the sun rising behind it. He stared at Hinata with the same look as he always did, disdain and disappointment combined in a stern gaze, as she wiped her eyes with her hand. She'd never been in this room before, but she'd been in this situation before. She'd gotten in trouble enough to see her father perhaps seven times in her whole life, but it felt like it had happened countless more times than that. The way he always stared at her when he saw her seemed to make time itself slow down to a crawl.

"Hinata," he said.

Out of habit, she bowed respectfully.

"F-father," she said, trying to keep more tears from falling.

She failed, and felt her face turning red with humiliation at her condition as she stood up again.

_Hyuga women do not turn red when they cry_, she recited to herself in her mind, a habitual reminder of one of her many failures.

She kept her eyes down. Again, this was partly out of respect, but also to avoid seeing her father's look of disapproval, and to keep him from looking straight through her when he saw her eyes. Out of her peripheral vision she saw Hiashi look on silently for a while, until eventually he spoke again.

"If you cannot hear what I just said without reacting, you are not ready to be a chunin," he said.

Hinata almost spoke, but she lacked the strength to correct him. Hiashi waited for a response, but none came.

"Take her to the dining hall," he ordered Orora.

She gasped. It was close to the start of breakfast now, and soon everybody in the clan would be sitting in the hall. She'd seen this manner of punishment for misconduct happen before, but always from the view of an observer. She'd seen sobbing children led into the hall and ordered to explain their misdemeanour; they rarely got through the rest of the meal without being quietly mocked by their elders or jeered at by their peers. The only one she'd seen suffer this punishment and never cry at all was Neji. He didn't ever seem to feel any kind of remorse about whatever he was accused of doing, and he inevitably responded to taunts from his peers by dignifiedly ignoring them. She almost admired his resolve, even if it was at the cost of near-permanent solitude.

They were going to do it to her, now. She was old, much older than the children that were usually subject to this punishment. To be twelve years old and sent to the dining hall was in itself yet another punishment. She'd not only failed to remain stoic, she'd failed to be an adult.

Hinata kept her mouth closed to try and hide the sob that was rising in her throat. Orora stopped in front of her, frowning. He looked at her for a moment, eyes searching, then turned back to look to his lord.

"Orora," said Hiashi, expectantly.

The younger Hyuga looked uncomfortable.

"Lord Hiashi, she-"

"_Now_," said Hiashi.

After a moment of further consideration, Orora slowly nodded and stepped forward. His hand reached out onto Hinata's shoulder.

Hinata blinked, and suddenly her eyes were no longer full of tears. They felt warm, and she realised that they were filling up with chakra like she was activating the Byakugan.

_Why are they doing that?_ she thought.

She wasn't making a hand sign, but the chakra seemed to flow up to her eyes by itself. Blinking again, she tried to make the chakra stop, but it kept on moving upward from her chest to her eyes. She breathed in and out as slowly as she could and shut her eyes tightly, wishing that this was just another nightmare. This was no time to lose control.

Then there was a white-hot pain in her head as a massive chakra surge coursed through her entire body. Through instinct or fear, Orora's grip on her shoulder tightened, but she barely felt it.

Her eyes flew open, and the world was different.

She could see the chakra networks of her father and Orora, and those of a few women walking down stairs behind her. She could see for hundreds of metres outside the window in the office behind them. The world seemed made of mist and smoke around the bright, glowing blue of the chakra of so many living things. This was the Byakugan, but more powerful than she had ever felt it before.

Then, Hiashi smiled.

"Hinata," he said, "you have done well."

_What?_

Orora was so surprised at this he let go of Hinata, who quickly made a hand sign and shut off the Byakugan. Something was wrong here. Her father never smiled.

Taking her confused silence as a sign to continue, Hiashi spoke again.

"You have unlocked a more powerful level of the Byakugan," he said.

"H-…how?" asked Hinata.

"By reaching a powerful emotional state," said Hiashi. "In this case, sadness."

Hinata let the answer settle over her, and looked up at her father, who gazed on her with…_pride_.

She should have felt happy. To have Hiashi look at her with anything other than dismissive apathy was what she'd wanted for years. But only a minute ago he'd said how disappointed in her he was. If this was an accident, he should have sounded more surprised. He should have been happy that his daughter had finally reached a level he could accept.

Unless…

"F-father…" she said. "Did you plan f-for this to happen?"

"Yes," said Hiashi, quite calmly. "And it worked."

Hinata didn't cry. Not that time. She had cried before, but there was no sadness left within her. Chakra was physical and spiritual energy, and it felt as if all the sadness that she had before had been drained away to form it. The mists around Hinata's eyes had cleared.

She could see what Hiashi had done to her. She could see that he wasn't proud of her, he was proud of himself, pleased that his experiment had succeeded. She'd seen that look before, barely a few days ago, when Neji had paralysed her arm. Neji had trapped her then, and her father thought he had trapped her now.

She concentrated, and stared blankly at Hiashi as the chakra went down to her legs, hoping to stall for as long as she could.

"Th-thankyou, father," she said, and bowed.

Hiashi began to speak, but Hinata never knew what he said, because at that moment she chakra-jumped into the air from her bow, aiming for the window. Quickly, and almost imperceptibly, Hiashi activated his Byakugan and struck at her torso, hitting it on the right side. The chakra in her right leg slowed down and Hinata fell to the floor of the office painfully, wincing as she landed. Getting up, she looked back at her father, standing in front of Orora in the doorframe.

"Hinata," he said, sternness returning to his voice, "get up."

She was certain that she couldn't make the jump out the window now. With her leg the way it was, she would be lucky to jump at all. By all accounts, it should have been over.

She was equally certain that she was not going to do what her father said.

She saw his eyes thin with anger through the all-pervading gaze of her Byakugan as he looked at her from above. She kept her real eyes down, having learned long ago that eye contact was the key to Hiashi's power over her, and hoped for a miracle.

Orora suddenly spoke.

"Lady Hinata," he said, "you have dropped your kunai."

Hinata felt at her side, and realised Orora was right. Frowning, Hiashi turned to say something to him, then Hinata realised what Orora had done.

_A distraction!_

Hiashi seemed to realise as well, because he began to turn his head back to Hinata barely a second after Orora had spoken, but by then she was in mid-air again. She flew out of the window, wind whipping at her hair as she sped towards the ground. She landed perfectly and leapt upwards again, leaving the Hyuga compound behind her, finally on her own.

00000

Kiba and Shino stood next to each other, much as they had for the past twenty minutes. Both had been eager to leave the village for the first time and had reached the gate extremely early, and both had said nothing to each other the entire time they were there. Shino stood very still, Kiba fidgeted, and Akamaru sat quietly on Kiba's head.

Eventually, it grew to such a point that even Shino noticed how awkward it was, and so was at least a little relieved when Kiba spoke.

"...hi," said Kiba.

Shino nodded at Kiba, then returned to his previous position of staring at nothing.

Kiba looked annoyed.

"You really should actually say 'hi' back to someone, you know," he said.

Shino frowned.

_Why should I be required to do that? _he thought. _Why shouldn't I just nod? Do people no longer understand nodding? If nodding means the same as speaking, then there is no need to speak!_

"Hnn," he said.

The silence returned, and this time, it was even less personal.

They stood in front of the village gate for three more minutes before they saw Hinata, jumping across town gracefully, then landing a few metres away from them. Watching carefully, Kiba was about to enact the next part of his plan to get Hinata and Shino to open up when he realised Hinata had been crying. She'd hidden it well – her eyes weren't particularly red, and her face seemed normal as ever – but Kiba could tell something in her movements meant she was upset about something, and he could smell tears.

"Hey, Hinata," he said, gently.

Shino nodded, the same way he had to Kiba. He hadn't seemed to have noticed Hinata's problem, which Kiba thought was very typical of him. He didn't seem to care much about anything, or anyone.

"Good m-morning," said Hinata, still polite as she'd always been.

Kiba had heard the phrase 'good breeding' before, and he'd never really gotten what it had meant. Sure, you could apply it to dogs. A spotted dog would probably have puppies with spots, a black dog would probably have black puppies, and whatever. But he'd always heard it in reference to people, and he didn't really get why. People weren't exactly like their parents, or their grandparents, or whatever, so why people would think that was the only reason for how someone was sounded stupid to Kiba. It wasn't like he was born knowing how to be a ninja just because his mother knew how to be a ninja. And besides, if all that mattered was your parents, why were he and his sister so different?

It seemed to Kiba that what people _meant_ by 'good breeding' was actually 'we taught this person manners', and from what he could tell, Hinata had been taught manners. Or maybe she'd been taught 'etiquette', which Kiba assumed was manners for rich people. But even without taking that into account, he knew that Hinata was nice. That was something not everybody was taught, and being nice didn't necessarily mean being well-mannered.

_Which is where I come in_, thought Kiba.

"Are you okay?" asked Kiba.

"Y-yes, I'm fine," said Hinata. "Why?"

Kiba pointed at her shoulders.

"There's stuff on you," he said. "What is that?"

Hinata looked down at her shoulders, and Kiba was tempted to just drop the matter. She didn't look comfortable, being asked this. But as he'd once been told, comfortable wasn't always the best way to be.

"...uh..."

"Glass," said Shino, the first actual word he'd said around Kiba all day.

A quick glance from Kiba confirmed that Shino was right. As Hinata brushed it off her shoulders carefully, Kiba looked to Shino, who seemed attentive, if not quite so concerned as Kiba was.

"Why do you have glass on your shoulders?" asked Kiba.

"..n-no reason," said Hinata. "I-it's n-nothing, really."

"Hinata," he said, "I meant what I said yesterday."

Shino frowned, perplexed at this apparently meaningful sentence. He mentally flipped through his memories of yesterday, and found nothing of particular importance that Kiba had said to Hinata. He'd encouraged her sometimes, yes, but that didn't seem particularly relevant to the situation at hand. He privately didn't think much of Kiba's interrogation – if Hinata didn't want to tell anyone why she had glass on her shoulders, that was her business – but was surprised when Hinata looked back up to Kiba, and then glanced at him.

"I j-jumped out of a window," she said. "A closed window. This m-morning."

Shino saw Kiba look to him, now thoughtful, not at all like the playful fool he'd been before she'd gotten there. His eyes were a warning, some kind of command for Shino to do something, although Shino had no idea what it was. Whatever it was, it was very effective, because Shino decided to join the conversation.

"How did you break the glass?" he asked.

Kiba looked at him again, and Shino guessed that this wasn't quite what he had expected Shino to say. That happened to Shino a lot when he wasn't speaking to members of his clan. Some Aburame prided themselves on it, and particularly praised Shino for his apparently confusing answers. They said it made him harder to predict.

Shino thought that if those Aburame had known Hinata, though, they would have a difficult time predicting what she would do. He knew that she was unlike any Hyuga or girl he'd ever had dealings with before. She was thinking his question over, emotions that Shino couldn't place at all passing through her face.

Was she planning to lie? Shino knew he would have. Kiba shouldn't have interfered, whatever connection he had with her. Actually, what connection _did_ they have? Shino had inferred Hinata was attracted to Naruto; was Kiba attracted to her? He wasn't sure, but it didn't seem that way. Kiba had said on the day they became a squad that he was supportive of Hinata's interest in Naruto, on account of his dislike of Sasuke. (Shino was uncertain, but he was fairly sure a dislike of Sasuke was the one thing both he and Kiba could agree on.) And Kiba seemed to be trying to start conversations with Hinata just as much as he tried to talk to him. That suggested there was no romantic motive.

Unless there _was_ a romantic motive for both of them, which...

_This is an unreasonable train of thought_, thought Shino hurriedly.

"I don't know," Hinata admitted.

Shino thought this sounded like she was avoiding the question, mostly because he himself did that almost constantly. Kiba seemed content with it, however, and as Kurenai had just appeared, the conversation was basically over.

"Good morning," she said.

"Good morning, sensei," they responded, basically in unison.

"Does everyone have what they need?" asked Kurenai.

They all nodded, hands on their backpacks.

"Alright," said Kurenai, "let's go."

The three children began to follow Kurenai out of the village, walking side-by-side. Reaching the gate, she stopped and turned to face her squad.

"Have any of you left the village before?" she asked. "At all?"

They all shook their heads.

Kurenai breathed in deeply, closed her eyes, and was as honest as she could be.

"It's dangerous outside Konoha," she said. "Very dangerous. Even on a C-rank mission, you're more than likely to get hurt...maybe even killed."

Opening her eyes again, she saw that of the three of them, strangely enough, Hinata looked like she was the least worried. What was in her eyes was no look of resignation, but acceptance and determination. She'd never looked at Kurenai that way before, but Kurenai knew something had given her this newfound strength. Kiba looked a little scared but still determined, and the usually imperceptible Shino nodded quite fervently before quickly going back to his usual stoic expression. This squad wasn't discouraged by what she had just said.

"If you're in danger," said Kurenai, "I want you to trust your squadmates to come to your aid. I'll be there, but as the jonin, I'm the biggest target. If we're attacked, they'll take me out first. If I'm captured, you run and get help; if I'm killed, you go back to Konoha as fast as you can. Can you promise me that?"

"Yes, Kurenai-sensei," said Hinata.

There was silence.

"...and you two?" asked Kurenai, looking at Kiba and Shino.

Kiba and Shino looked at each other.

"Uh...I agree with Hinata. Do you?" he asked Shino.

"Yes," said Shino, "I agree as well."

"Alright," said Kurenai.

Using a hand signal, the enormous gate in front of Squad Eight slowly swung open. Hinata felt her hair rustle in the wind as leaves floated down from the trees behind her. She went forth with the others, wondering if she would feel different outside the village.

She stepped over the threshold. She didn't. The boys ahead of her stared out into the path before them, the branches of the pine trees swaying. Alone among the squad, Hinata looked back at the only world she'd ever known, and thought how small it had become.

"Not homesick already?" asked Kurenai, in a tone far softer than a sensei would usually speak to their genin.

Hinata thought about this.

"No," she said.

And there, she wasn't lying.

000000

Hinata looked up at the huge pine trees next to the road, and wondered how old they were. Although the road outside the village was wide enough for the squad to walk side-by-side, even with Akamaru walking next to Kiba, the three genin walked slightly back from Kurenai, still unsure of where their leader was taking them.

They walked for perhaps an hour on the road, all steadily growing hotter as the sun got closer to noon, when they came to a slightly smaller path through the trees that branched off from the road. Kurenai entered this cautiously and the three followed, stepping carefully over logs and twigs that had fallen on the path. It clearly hadn't been used in a while.

After a few more minutes of walking, Kurenai looked back to them and said:

"Everyone remembers why we're here, right?"

"To check on Hisui?" asked Kiba, picking up Akamaru.

"Yes," said Kurenai. "But...there is another thing."

Hinata suddenly looked concerned.

"A-another thing?"

"After we check up on Hisui, we won't be going straight back to Konoha. We'll take a boat north, to the Land of Waves. That's why the whole trip will take eight days."

"Why?" asked Kiba.

"There's been reports of Konoha missing-nin passing through that area," said Kurenai. "A ninja who defects from their village is almost always a criminal of some kind. If we can establish who they are and what they're doing there-"

"We can get 'em!" said Kiba. "Ah...sorry for interrupting, Kurenai-sensei."

"Thankyou," said Kurenai. "But we won't be in any kind of contact with enemy ninja, if the plan goes right. Squad Eight is a reconnaissance squad, and that means we'll be dealing primarily with civilians. So, if possible, don't tell anyone you're a ninja."

Shino frowned.

"We're wearing headbands, sensei," he said.

"Good point," said Kurenai, "although there is the occasional no-headband mission. Even so, some people don't know enough about ninja to understand the headband system. If civilians do find out that you're ninja, don't tell them everything you can do."

Kiba jumped over a log and said:

"Why not? Don't we wanna make people think twice about messing with us?"

"If possible, no," Kurenai responded.

Kiba looked confused.

"It's like the dark," Kurenai explained. "Are any of you afraid of the dark?"

"'Course not!" said Kiba.

"N-no," said Hinata.

"Hrrm," Shino said. (It was a negative 'hrrm'.)

_Didn't think so_, thought Kurenai.

She then asked:

"Were you when you were younger?"

Nobody admitted it.

"Okay," she continued, ducking under a low branch, "let's say you were. Why would you be?"

"Because th-there c-could be anything out there?" asked Hinata, stepping to the side of the branch.

"Exactly. The less you know about something, the less you know what it could do."

There was a moment of silence as Kiba and Hinata both tried very hard not to look at Shino, and mostly succeeded.

"So...we're the dark?" asked Shino.

"Yes. Very poetic, Shino."

He nodded curtly.

"So, we don't tell any civilians about our abilities," said Kiba. "Say, on a mission, we run into other ninja. What do we do to them?"

Kurenai looked back at him as she stepped down past a tree stump, concern on her face. Kiba had phrased the question casually, but he didn't look like he would have regarded running into enemy ninja as a bad thing.

"Recon squads are meant to avoid fighting where possible," she said. "On this mission, I'm hoping we won't run into anything worse than bandits or wild dogs, but other ninja are a whole different ballpark. If we're attacked by a missing-nin, everyone be extremely careful. And if we run into someone from another hidden village, I want you all to stay behind me, and if I tell you to run, run."

Kiba was looking dangerously mutinous, but surprisingly it was Shino who objected.

"Ninja should not surrender, sensei," he said.

Kurenai raised an eyebrow, and Kiba looked surprised that Shino had said that. Hinata threw a nervous look at Kurenai, as if asking her not to chastise Shino. Despite herself, Kurenai didn't rebuke him.

_I'll talk with him later,_ she thought.

"Why?" she asked, deciding to at least hear him out.

"It's part of the Shinobi Rules, isn't it?" he said.

That was going too far, she decided.

"Are you saying you know the Shinobi Rules better than I do, Shino?"

An almost-imperceptible change occurred in Shino's expression. He carefully pushed his glasses up closer to his face, and said in a tone less confident:

"I..._know_ them," he said.

Kiba shook his head and laughed quietly.

"What, you've read all of 'em?"

"Yes," said Shino.

Kiba kept laughing until he realised what Shino had said. Staring at him in shock, he managed to splutter out incredulously:

"You know _every_ Shinobi Rule?"

"I attempted to learn them," said Shino. "But I may not have perfect recall."

_Yeah, thought so,_ thought Kiba. _Nobody knows __**every**__ Shinobi Rule. Not even as big a know-it-all as you._

"W-why did you learn _all_ of them?" asked Hinata.

Shino shrugged vaguely.

"It filled the time," he said.

"Why-" began Kiba, but Kurenai quickly interrupted him.

"You are right, Shino," Kurenai admitted. "The Shinobi Rules do say that. What's important for all of you to remember is that every ninja interprets the Shinobi Rules their own way. You are all free to as well, but don't forget them entirely."

As they walked, the forest around them grew denser and denser, the path narrowing more and more. Ducking to avoid low branches, Kurenai led them through an empty thicket. Hinata saw the trees slowly take on a different shade of green, a lighter shade, and realised that they were different sorts of trees to the ones normally seen.

"Alright;" said Kurenai, "this is the start of the path. We won't be able to talk much for the time that we're in it."

"Sensei," said Hinata, "Why are the t-trees so...strange?"

"The First Hokage," said Kurenai. "Hashirama Senju had an ability to make trees and other plants grow wherever he wished. This jungle grew from a single plant he imported from thousands of miles away. A lot of unusual animals thrive inside here."

"Unusual?" asked Kiba. "Meaning what? Diseased? Do they like eating people?"

Akamaru whined.

"Or dogs?" he added.

"I don't think so," said Kurenai.

"How long will we be within the jungle?" asked Shino.

"Two days," she said.

Seeing the rather shocked looks on the faces of her squad and Akamaru's even higher-pitched wine, she quickly added:

"It does get wider."

"C-can't we chakra-jump?" asked Hinata.

"No," said Kurenai. "This forest's trees are very old, and they've got spiked vines all through them. Even if one of them could support our weight, there's a strong chance the vines would hurt us."

"I can smell for trouble if you want, sensei," said Kiba.

"Alright," said Kurenai. "Thankyou, Kiba."

Hinata wondered if she should use her Byakugan as well, and began to ask when she noticed Shino looking at her with a concerned expression on his face. It was strange to see him look like that, and the way he held his gaze on her reminded her of her father. This done, he turned away.

She then remembered his request that the squad members not use their powers on each other, and Kurenai's reminder to her that she could find out Shino's unique ability easily. But what jutsu could only the Byakugan see?

Full of questions, Hinata and her squad walked into the jungle.

00000

Two days later, the first thing Hinata noticed when the squad got out of the jungle was that she was surprisingly happy to see pine trees. The trees that were so common in Konoha she normally barely paid them any attention at all were now a sight for very weary eyes. She and Kiba were no longer wearing their jackets, and Akamaru had planted himself on Kiba's backpack and gone into a sort of heat-induced hibernation.

Kurenai and Shino, in contrast, were still dressed exactly the same as they were the day they went inside the path. Hinata guessed that Kurenai dressed the same because she hadn't worn a jacket to begin with, but she had no explanation for why Shino had worn his jacket the entire time. He hadn't seemed to sweat at all, either, although he seemed to have to push his glasses back up much more frequently.

"Huh," said Kiba, surprised.

"W-what?" asked Hinata.

"I _still_ haven't been bitten by any bugs," he said. "Minor miracle, really."

Kurenai smiled quietly at Shino, who didn't seem to respond.

"If the First Hokage wasn't dead," said Kiba, "I would definitely kill him myself."

Akamaru woofed feebly.

"After I had a drink first," said Kiba.

They trudged on for roughly half an hour, on a gravel path much more pleasant than the one in the jungle. The trees never stopped entirely, but they slowly opened up into a much wider road, until eventually the squad could see a giant wall in the distance.

"That's Hisui," said Kurenai. "Looks like they've upgraded their wall since last time I was here.

Much beleaguered, the squad went down to the gate of the village where they found a guard waiting. Dressed in armour, she snapped to attention at the approach of Kurenai.

"I'm afraid you can't go any further, ma'am," the guard said. "There's a plague in the village, and it's under quarantine."

"Is that why you're the only guard?" asked Kiba.

Kurenai looked at him disapprovingly, and he nodded in deference. The guard watched this with interest, then noticed their headbands.

"You're Hidden-Leaf ninja?" she said.

"Yes," said Kurenai. "We're passing through on our way to Toride."

"If you're going to Toride, this is an unusual route to be taking."

Kurenai leaned in towards the guard and smiled, in fake-confidence with her.

"There's a lot of roads that're watched nowadays," she whispered. "It's why we took the jungle route. I'd...appreciate it if you kept this quiet."

Hinata saw her slip a surprisingly large amount of ryo into the guard's pocket.

"Very well, ma'am," the guard said, standing straighter than before. "There's a teahouse not far from here, that way. The people who weren't infected stayed there for a while, but they've all gone to the Land of Waves now. I'm sure the innkeep will appreciate you staying the night there."

"Thankyou," said Kurenai.

The squad turned and left in the direction the guard pointed. Nobody spoke for some time, all of them cautious despite the genins' inexperience. Letting the guard disappear off into the distance, eventually Hinata asked the most pressing question on her mind.

"Sensei," she said, "what's Toride?"

"It's a city to the East of the Land of Fire," Kurenai said. "One of the largest that isn't a Hidden Village. Not many ninja go there anymore."

"I've never heard of it," said Hinata, feeling uninformed.

"Really?" asked Kiba. "You've never heard of the Floating City?"

_That_ rang a bell to Hinata. She'd never heard the name 'Toride' before, but she'd definitely read about the Floating City somewhere. Shino, on the other hand, seemed unimpressed.

"Are we meant to?" he asked.

"Yeah," said Kiba, "we are meant to, because it's only the biggest, dirtiest, most dangerous town in the world."

"You sound...enthused by it," said Shino.

"What?" asked Kiba. "By Toride? No way. It's a crime-ridden hellhole. Only lowlifes and missing-nin go to Toride."

"Then why do you know so much about it?" asked Shino.

"Being a ninja can take you to some dark places," said Kiba. "I figure, the more I know about it, the better I'll be prepared in case I have to go there one day."

Shino shook his head, and perhaps quietly said "hrrm". Kiba shrugged at him, clearly unaffected by his disapproval, and patted Akamaru, who seemed a little more energised by now, his tail even wagging a little.

"Do you think she believed you, sensei?" Shino asked. "The guard."

Kurenai looked down at him.

"Maybe not," she said. "But the money should keep her quiet. In any case, she knows we're ninja, but not that we're investigating Hisui."

"You don't think there's a plague?" he asked.

"No," said Kurenai. "I don't."

00000

Hinata rubbed her face against the soft sheets of her bed, and frowned at the fact that she was still awake. She had no idea what hour it was, but it had definitely been a long time since she'd woken up, and she wanted to actually sleep in a bed before two more days of lying in a jungle. She'd been trying to sleep for what seemed like hours, but a single thought kept working its way around her head:

_What am I going to do when I get home?_

Once she got back to Konoha, she would have to face what she'd done in the office. She wasn't the clan heir anymore. With Hanabi in training, Hinata was surplus to requirements, and she knew her father wouldn't just accept her back without some kind of punishment. What would happen to her? It would be unusual for the clan leader to exile one of his one daughters, and he would need the Hyuga council's support if he did make her leave, but still...

Sighing at her situation, Hinata stared up at the bottom of the bed above her. She had been put in a room by herself with bunk-beds, much like Kiba and Shino had. The innkeeper had said that they could opt to not share rooms if they wanted to, both quickly agreeing. Hinata wondered why Kiba was so willing to be friends with her and not Shino; couldn't he 'adopt' Shino like he had her?

_Probably not_, she thought. _Kiba is stubborn, but I think Shino is even more so._

Her vision blurring, Hinata had almost finally fallen asleep when she noticed something. On the top of her bunk was a marking, carved into the wood with some kind of knife. It was a series of circles, although it was so roughly drawn most of them ended up as ellipses or even rounded-off triangles. The circles all interlocked with each other in such a way that they seemed to form what looked like the shape of a flower. Reaching up towards it, she touched the pattern, feeling around it for some kind of trigger or latch. Finding none, she let go immediately.

Then, she touched the pattern again, feeling the wood below it. Moving her hand down away from the pattern, she touched the wood there and noticed it felt different; something had been done in the area of the pattern. The wood below the pattern felt like it part of the varnish had been carefully scraped away.

Something was hidden there, and Hinata forgot her wish for sleep in the desire to find out what it was. She only knew one way to reveal the hidden.

"Byakugan," she said, and it came into view.

The pattern was still visible, but it was completely unimportant in comparison to what else was there. A triangle inside a circle covered the wood, with mysterious writing across its edges and circumference. The circle was split into quarters: one bright and sunny, one with brown leaves falling, one white with sharp-edged snowflakes falling, and one with blue skies above a lotus in water. Within the triangle was a being of white and gold, male, standing on two legs but with four arms, each pointed at one of the quarters. The being had no face, a swirling symbol covering that part of their head.

Hinata stared in wonder and fear at the picture. It was beautiful, in its own way, but felt somehow wrong, like a distortion of normality. The figure's symbol where its face should have been seemed to stare like an eye and breathe like a mouth at the same time. How had anyone painted something this intricate? Why would they carve that particular symbol on it? Most importantly, though, was the fact that it could only be seen by the Byakugan. There were paints that only the Byakugan could see, but those were a very well-kept secret of the Hyuga clan; how had that leaked out?

Looking away as she deactivated the Byakugan, she saw something out of the corner of her eye and quickly turned the Byakugan back on again. Now she saw it clearer: there were men in the corridor, surrounding the rooms.

Scrambling, Hinata instinctively held the bedcovers up over her head, although this did nothing to block her view. She then felt stupid and threw them off, then quickly got out of the bed, heart racing as one of the men took out a knife and started walking towards her room's door.

Hiding behind a wardrobe door, she thought back to school and came up with something. With a few hand seals she created a clone and had it lie down on her bed. As an intangible construct made of what was basically slightly compressed air, the clone lay above the bed's blankets; it wasn't solid enough to support them, and Hinata wasn't talented enough to create false-blankets as well as hide the real ones. Crouching behind the wardrobe door, she wished she could create actual shadow clones, but she guessed this would work. She hoped so, anyway.

She tensed again as the door began to slide open. Breathing in, she saw through the wardrobe door as the man entered, walking oddly jerkily. He reached down towards the clone with his unarmed hand, as if to strangle it. Hinata felt a tinge of revulsion as she watched herself about to be killed. She breathed in, and readied herself.

Just as the hand touched the clone, Hinata dived through the air and kicked the man in the knees, destabilising his balance and knocking him to the ground. He thrust up with the knife, narrowly missing her shoulder, and stomped down on his crotch as she tried to knock the knife out of his hand.

Jumping off him, she was disturbed to notice that neither the stomping nor the disarming seemed to have much effect on the man at all. Stepping back, she wished she had her shoes; bare feet were an obvious target for an assassin. Looking nervous, she held out a hand as the man stepped towards her and moved around so she had her back to the rest of her room. She didn't like being backed into a corner, but she guessed it was better than having her back to the corridor, where more of those men could sneak-attack her.

The man continued to approach her, all dressed in tightly-wrapped black bandages. Still nervous, Hinata breathed in quickly and held her open hand out, wondering when Kurenai was going to rescue her.

_She will_, she thought. _Kurenai-sensei could easily get rid of him._

He drew closer, slowly and deliberately.

"...h...help," she whispered.

She tried saying it again, and louder, but the man suddenly ran forward and wrapped his off-hand around her neck. His hands felt rough on her skin as he pulled the knife up, soon to bring it down again.

She breathed even faster as the hand held her. Strangely, it didn't feel like she was going to die. She wasn't crying, or anything. Really, it had all come so sudden, there was no time to reflect on it at all.

Expecting that these were her last moments, Hinata wondered why she still had the Byakugan on. It was strangely beautiful, seeing the man's chakra network before her as it slowly pulsed a dull blue. Was death meant to seem this comforting?

It was then that she remembered she had one free hand. The question of how she was going to get out of this didn't come to her mind, but a memory did. She'd escaped everything before this. She'd escaped her father, her tormentors at school, her tyrannical Gentle Fist instructors. She'd always escaped. She'd always gotten out.

So when she hit the man in the stomach with a punch so hard he seemed to show pain even in those otherwise expressionless eyes, it seemed like the obvious thing to do.

Watching him collapse before her, Hinata looked down at her left hand. It had always been her weaker one, but now she could see it glowing with chakra. Staring at her hand, what looked like a tiny needle of pure light was coming out of her palm.

Despite herself, she laughed.

"They said I never w-would," she thought out loud, "but e-even the clan's b-biggest failure can learn Gentle F-"

Hinata's sentence was interrupted by a loud cracking sound and her own shriek as her wardrobe doors swung open to reveal a man's body, wood splinters embedded into the doors, a great deal of holes in the back of the wardrobe and what looked like very dark, sticky blood. Switching off the Byakugan, she could only stare in surprise as the lights in her room were switched on and Kiba came inside, Akamaru beside him.

"K...kiba?" she said.

"Wow," said Kiba, looking surprised at the state of Hinata's wardrobe. "It's never done that much damage before! Take a note, Akamaru: Fang Over Fang is _very_ messy in small spaces."

He turned to Hinata.

"Sorry about your room," he said.

"Th-that's fine," she said. "How did you-"

"Do that? That's Fang Over Fang," he said proudly. "It's a taijutsu move Akamaru and I do."

"H-how?"

"Basically, we spin," said Kiba. "A lot. And you can see the results."

Hinata nodded, and tried not to look at or smell the results. Kiba looked down at her bed and the man at the foot of it, and asked:

"How'd you get him?"

"Uh..." Hinata twiddled her fingers. "Um...I u-used Gentle Fist."

"Your clan's taijutsu?" asked Kiba. "I thought you said you couldn't do that?"

Hinata thought on this.

"I g-guess I can now," she said, uncertain. "Unless it was a fluke."

"Well, try doing it again," said Kiba.

Hinata nodded.

"Byakugan," she said, and held up her palm.

She concentrated hard on the point where it met her wrist, and in a few seconds the blue needle of chakra appeared. She laughed in triumph and showed her hand to Kiba, who smiled as well.

"'Fluke'," he said. "See, you can definitely do it."

Conscious of a sudden glowing in the room, Hinata turned off the Byakugan and the chakra-needle, not wanting to show off. But the glow remained, and she turned to Kiba to ask why when he stared at the body in the wardrobe.

"Uh...what's going on with that body?"

She looked at it, and realised it was the source of the glow. The body lit up, brighter than the lightbulb, and they could see tiny speckles of green in the dark red of the man's blood.

"What the he-" began Kiba, but he was interrupted by a loud thumping noise down the hall.

"Shino," said Hinata.

The two genin ran out of her room, passing Kiba's much-damaged door as they went. They flung the door open to find Shino struggling with three of the men, backed into a corner and frantically trying to keep them off him. The light was off, but Hinata could see by the light of the corridor that moths were chaotically flying around the room.

Hinata began to walk in, but Kiba pushed her away.

"We'll handle this," he said, and nodded to Akamaru.

Hinata began to protest as together the Inuzuka and his dog took a run up to the men. Jumping into the air, both spun rapidly as they collided with the assassins, slicing them in the back and neck and pushing them away from Shino. Blood flew through the air as Kiba and Akamaru finished, standing up and looking to Shino. Around the scene, the moths slowed down and flew away.

"I c-could have helped," Hinata told Kiba.

"Yeah, sorry," said Kiba, "I thought Fang Over Fang was quicker."

"Okay," said Hinata. "Are you alright, Shino?"

"Yes," he said. "We should find Kurenai-sensei."

"Guys?" said Kiba.

They look at him, and he pointed to the bodies of the men. They were glowing again, like before, and once again they could see tiny speckles of green.

"Like the one from before..." said Hinata.

Kiba squinted, and then said:

"That green stuff is inside their bodies. Looks like...rocks."

"Jade," said Shino.

"Why would anyone get jade put inside them?" asked Kiba.

"And how would they survive the procedure?" wondered Shino.

Hinata stepped forward and turned on the light. She looked at the bodies of the men, cut up by Kiba and Akamaru's attack, and saw the rotted skin beneath the black wrappings, interspersed with tiny pieces of jade.

"I d-don't think they did survive the procedure..." she said.

Suddenly, the bodies started to move, arms moving to push themselves up roughly, the blood around them congealing quickly as they stood up. Once on two feet they were motionless once more, staring at Squad Eight with expressionless eyes.

"...or not," she said.

A sudden oily grasp took hold of Hinata's ankle, and she shrieked in fear when she saw that it was a hand, covered in the black blood she'd seen from before, dragging along the glowing body that she had seen in her wardrobe before. It was missing its lower body, only a torso, a head and one hand, but the half-body's head stared up at Hinata and she saw its mouth open beneath the pitch-coloured rags that covered its face.

"Run!" shouted Kiba.

Hinata stamped down on the corpse's arm with her other foot, and the hand came loose. Quickly kicking at it, she ran with Shino and Kiba, Akamaru bounding through the air, the corpses fading from view as they turned the corridor.

"Where are we going?" asked Kiba.

"Kurenai's room!" said Shino.

They went down the corridor as fast as they could, finding Kurenai's room unlocked. All inside, they found an empty double-bed with the window open. Hinata leaned on the now-closed door, breathing heavily.

"Okay," said Kiba. "I can't smell any blood in here, except what's on us already."

"So?" asked Shino.

"No blood means no struggle," said Kiba. "I mean, I don't think those zombies got Kurenai. She must've gotten away."

"'Zombies'?" asked Shino, perplexed.

"What," said Kiba, "you don't know what zombies are?"

"No," said Shino.

"For a guy who knows everything, you really don't know much," said Kiba. "The walking dead?"

"You mean, a living corpse?" asked Shino. "Like a kyonshi?"

"Yes," said Hinata.

"What's a kyonshi?" asked Kiba.

"It's l-like a zombie," she said.

"Oh, okay."

"I don't know what connection jade has with kyonshi," said Shino. "There are jutsu to make corpses move again, but I don't think they need jade...in any case, it's not relevant right now."

"We should look through the rest of the teahouse," said Kiba.

"I-I'll do that," said Hinata quickly. "_Byakugan_."

"Wait-" said Shino.

Hinata suddenly deactivated the Byakugan, looking extremely concerned.

"What?" asked Kiba. "What? Did you see her?"

"...you kn-know how we were being chased by the jade zombies before?" she said.

"Yeah?"

The door thumped.

"Oh," said Shino.

Hinata was pushed forward again as she felt the door nearly open. Yelling, the two boys and Akamaru came to help her close it again, and with the four of them there the door was pushed back to closed. It thumped a little once more as they pushed on it, all close together.

"What do we do?" asked Shino.

"Uh, _maybe_ keep the door closed?" suggested Kiba.

"I meant a more long-term solution!"

The thumps grew stronger again, and Akamaru barked at the door. Hinata had her back and hands pushing on the door, but Kiba and Shino were both having trouble getting a good hold on it. With Akamaru as well, there wasn't enough space for all of them to stop the door up.

"Shino," said Hinata. "There's not enough space. You stand back, and we'll hold the door. Then we can let the door open, and you can throw kunai at them."

"What?" asked Kiba.

"Kiba's the strongest of us," said Hinata, "and your aim is b-better than mine."

Shino looked at her, still holding the door as it thumped again.

"Go," she urged, "quickly!"

"Very well," said Shino. "You two give me your kunai."

The other two said nothing.

"...don't you have it?" asked Shino.

"I think it's in m-my room," said Hinata.

"Mine too," said Kiba.

"Why?" asked Shino.

"Well, I'm sorry neither of us sleep with our weapons, like _you_ apparently do!"

Kiba and Shino mutually glared at each other as Shino stepped back, giving Kiba and Hinata more space. Hinata turned around to hold the door with just her hands, and stepped out of Akamaru's way.

"We'll let go on the count of three," she said.

"I'll certainly do a great deal of damage with _one _kunai," muttered Shino, drawing his own kunai.

"One," counted Hinata.

"Up on my head, boy," said Kiba, and Akamaru climbed up.

"Perhaps it'll go through two of them standing in a row," said Shino, preparing to throw beside Kurenai's bed.

"Two…" Hinata counted.

Shino crouched slightly as Hinata and Kiba held on, now to one side of the door so they could get out of the way more easily. Still pushing against the thumps rising in intensity, Hinata breathed in and spoke again.

"…thr-"

She was thrown to the ground as the door gave way, pushed back by the force of the jade-corpses as they entered the room, Kiba and Akamaru falling beside her. Shino immediately throw the kunai and hit a corpse, but only in the shoulder, and he watched helplessly as they pinned Kiba and Hinata's hands to the floor, stepping on the children's stomachs to keep them down as they readied knives.

_Now_, thought Shino, and he threw his arms out before him.

Out of his hands came first only a few insects, but in less than a second the few grew to a swarm. Flying through the air like pieces of shrapnel, the insects rustled with delight as they flew into the corpses' faces, stomaches and hands, chewing and biting with sharp mandibles, keeping them off his squadmates. He moved his hands, and the insects responded to his commands, pushing and tearing at the corpses to move them away from Hinata, Kiba and Akamaru.

The work done for then, he called the insects back to him and let them re-enter his body. Not waiting for the wounds to heal up, he went to his squadmates and pulled them up, putting Akamaru in Kiba's arms and half-dragging them out of the room. After a moment, they both were able to walk quickly, and the three went down the stairs.

"Okay," said Kiba, "what the hell did you just do with your hands? Was that genjutsu?"

Shino didn't respond for a moment, trying to work out the best way to explain it to a non-Aburame. He opted for directness.

"No," he said. "They were insects. Kikai. They're called kikai. They live inside my body."

Hinata looked horrified.

"They live..._in_ you?"

"…so you _do_ eat bugs!" said Kiba triumphantly.

"No," said Shino, resisting the urge to roll his eyes even though he knew neither would be able to see it. "They grow from a nest in my chest cavity."

He looked back at them.

"They will not cause you harm," he added. "I command them."

Hinata's feelings of revulsion swiftly gave way to realisation. He'd been so determined to avoid her using the Byakugan because he knew she'd be able to see the bugs inside him. Was this his unique power, or did every Aburame have a nest, like how every Hyuga had the Byakugan? How could he survive having insects inside his body? The one question answered had created a dozen more in her mind.

They reached the main foyer of the teahouse, where they had eaten dinner before. The old couple who owned the teahouse were slumped in seats near an unlit fireplace, knives in their chests. None of the genin said anything about them, but all turned away on seeing them, and Kiba seemed keen to change the topic.

"Always thought this place was spooky," he said. "Even in daylight."

Hinata looked at him, incredulous.

"Y-you did almost nothing but eat dumplings and play with Akamaru!"

Kiba shrugged.

"I was just puttin' a brave face on things," he said.

"We should attempt to track the jade-corpses," said Shino. "They must have taken Kurenai-sensei to Hisui."

"W-why are you so sure?" asked Hinata.

"She believed there was no plague there, and I am inclined to agree with her. Those assassins would not have been so robust if they were ill."

"Uh, they were dead," said Kiba. "You can't really get much sicker than that."

"True," said Shino, "but if they died of plague, why not simply infect us with it? Biological warfare would ultimately be far more damaging than knives."

"Y-you said that there are jutsu that can r-raise the dead," said Hinata. "How difficult are they to learn?"

"Extremely," said Shino. "It would take a very powerful ninja to perform it, particularly for multiple corpses like this. A plague would provide plentiful subjects."

"Okay," said Kiba, "so we're looking at strong enemy ninja. He thought he could take care of us with the zombies, but Kurenai's room was clean of any blood. He must've fought her by himself."

"And I doubt Kurenai would have been killed by a basic sneak-attack that left no blood or trace at all," said Shino. "This ninja would not have removed her from the teahouse simply to kill her elsewhere. I imagine their plan is torture."

Kiba, not looking appealed by that thought, stroked Akamaru thoughtfully.

"Maybe she got out of her room by herself, then they got her outside? Her window was open."

"Quite likely," said Shino. "Either she left of her own accord, or there are greater powers at work here."

Both nodding, they looked to Hinata. She felt sort of useless for having almost nothing to say, and wondered if Kiba and Shino were already surpassing her.

"We sh-should go," she said, "before the zombies c-come back."

00000

Kurenai pulled frantically at the ropes that were tied around her hands, desperately hoping that she could get them close enough together to perform the Escape Jutsu. She'd been attacked when she left her room through the window – it was a stupid thing to do, she now realised – and didn't think the children would have much chance if she'd been taken completely by surprise.

_Or I could just be really bad at this_, she thought.

She was tied to a stone table in what seemed to be Hisui's town square. The buildings around here were empty of human life, completely overgrown with an evil-looking vine, a thorny plant that didn't seem to belong in this place. It was dark, and the moon was half-full.

Her struggling was interrupted by the sound of footsteps; a few people, she guessed. Soon they came into view, five or six of them: tall figures dressed in black wraps, like rotted burial shrouds. They had a tint of green to them in some places, and they seemed expressionless. Their leader was similarly dressed, although his head and face were not covered. His hair was a light green, his eyes heavily lidded and lips thin.

"Good evening, Kurenai," he said. "I am Gishiki. There, now we know each other's names."

Kurenai remained silent.

"Ah, you intend not to give me the satisfaction of witty banter," said Gishiki. "Or perhaps you are incapable of doing so. I suppose I did give you a considerable amount of tranquiliser...oh well. It is not important. I am content to have a _captive_ audience."

Kurenai glared at him.

"What, not even a smile? I thought that was fairly good. My Jade Clones seemed to like it. Then again, they will do whatever I tell them to, so..."

He shrugged.

"Marvellous constructs, Jade Clones. They are bodies of the deceased with small pieces of jade surgically implanted in them – the recently deceased, see, the surgery must be done while the person is alive – that are powered by another person's chakra. Unfortunately, as I have discovered, any chakra expended in creating a Jade Clone is a permanent loss."

He pulled the shrouds from his sleeve to reveal a white arm, much paler than the rest of his body, and waved it around. He then casually pulled out a kunai and stabbed himself lightly in the wrist-vein, then pulled it out again. Pointing it in Kurenai's face, she was astonished to see no blood at all; just a blank cut that quickly faded to a scar, knitting back together.

"You see? No blood at all!"

He chuckled at this.

"Much as I have sacrificed for my work, though, it is the kindness of others that have caused me so much success. You see, Jade Clones need a living person's chakra, and I unfortunately don't have quite enough to spare anymore. So I'm going to borrow yours."

He stepped over to the other side of Kurenai.

"Don't worry, Kurenai. You won't die. You will be different, following the process, but if anything, you will be stronger under my control. The effects on the human brain, however, are...considerable, so I may have to re-explain this to you."

He leaned down, close to her face now, and poked at her hair as if curious.

"Is this...satisfactory to you?"

There were several whooshing sounds and then a dull thud, followed by a great whirring that came from about twenty metres away as kunai flew out of the vines and hit the Jade Clones in their stomaches, bringing them down. Then followed Akamaru, growling and barking as he torpedoed into a Jade Clone and spun around, spreading sap-like blood all over the town square. Finally, the growth was cut away, disappearing as if by magic, as Kurenai saw three figures jump out into the square: Hinata at the forefront, eyes blazing with the Byakugan; Shino to her left, kikai flying through the air and destroying the vines around them; Kiba to her right, pointing an accusatory finger at Gishiki as they finally landed in front of the table.

"Alright," he said, "hand her ove-"

Gishiki put his kunai to Kurenai's throat, and smiled.

"…oh," said Kiba.

"So, Kurenai," said Gishiki, holding her hair in a tightly bunched-up fist. "This is your squad..."

His eyes drifted over the three of them, standing as still as they could. Hinata's eyes stopped glowing with the Byakugan.

"Do you need to sit down, dear?" he asked her, a betrayal of real compassion in the curves of his smile.

She said nothing, already-big eyes growing wider. He turned his head at this curious new find, one half-familiar to him in some way he couldn't yet remember.

"However did you become a ninja?" he asked. "You're terrified, aren't you?"

She was still silent, but he went on anyway.

"Oh, don't worry. They are, too. The one with the dog always wastes a great deal of effort in failing, but he'll never admit it. He's been hiding behind that façade of eternal cheerfulness for some time."

Hinata didn't turn her head, but she could tell Kiba was still smiling when he spoke.

"You know," he said, "you talk _really_ fancy. Not even Shino uses so many long-ass words!"

"Hrrm," Shino nodded.

Hinata knew this brief conversation between Shino and Kiba was their way of reassuring themselves, and resolved not to give the man any satisfaction either.

"Aah," said Gishiki, "'Shino', is it? I've met your kind. Always so very…pragmatic."

Shino inclined his head slightly, a miniscule nod as if accepting a compliment.

"You didn't think this was a good idea, but you didn't want to draw attention to yourself either, so you let others make the decisions. Now you stand there, silent as ever, blank as ever, while your versatile mind ticks over how to defeat me. You are afraid, still, but you deal with it all so..."

He let the bunch of hair in his fist ripple a little, feeling the sensation on his palm. It was different to how he remembered a woman's hair to feel. He looked down at Kurenai in curiosity, but snapped his head back up when he saw the genin move towards him, his stare a warning.

"...logically," he finished.

Shino said nothing.

"Are you regretting it, Shino?" he continued. "You didn't want things to end up this way. This will look…unprofessional, to the village. Even if you, at least, escape."

The boy almost responded, but then said nothing again.

"You care about them," said Gishiki, "_enough_, but not as much as they want."

Shino made a short, unusually bitter laugh that didn't suit him.

"If they want me to care about them," he said, "I cannot speak for their taste in friends."

Gishiki laughed himself, a long, elated chuckle that made the three genin suddenly feel a lot colder than before.

"Oh, Shino," he said. "You hate yourself, don't you?"

He said it with a delighted air, as if he'd discovered a subtle change in the taste of a wine he was drinking.

"Are we done with the armchair psychology?" asked Kiba.

Gishiki looked back to him, and now spoke in a far more clipped tone:

"We will be finished when you are all dead, boy, and if you speak to me again I will cut your sensei's throat."

Shino's look didn't seem to change, but Gishiki evidently read something from it.

"I know, Shino," he said, now in a mockery of commiseration. "That would mean losing my hostage. But I'm not stalling the three of you while the cavalry arrive. I am not threatened by a trio of children who seem to have gathered more personal issues in thirteen years than most people manage their entire lives. I prolong this because I find it…stimulating."

As he said this, he put the knife closer to Kurenai's neck, looking at Hinata.

"Now," he said. "Girl. Tell me your name."

This was the second time Hinata felt sure she was going to die that night, and as things were, she would have preferred to fight the zombie again. She'd known many people that had talked like this, and often to her, but they had been her teachers. He had weaponised it, and the three of them were defenceless.

But there _were_ three of them. Not like that morning that felt so very long ago, when Hinata had to face her father by herself. Not like all those times she'd felt impossibly weak, up by herself at a desk, trying to work up the courage to say something to defend Naruto from all the people who hated him. She was trapped. All of them were trapped. But they were all trapped together, and that was the way out.

"N-no," she said.

Gishiki stabbed the knife into Kurenai's neck a tiny fraction, and Hinata gasped in sympathetic pain as tears left Kurenai's eyes, clenched in pain. Shino flinched at this, and Kiba stared breathing heavily.

"Let's try that again, shall we?" said Gishiki.

"H-…." began Hinata, "h-…"

"Yes," said Gishiki, now losing patients, "the stuttering makes people feel sorry for you, it is doubtless highly endearing to some, now _speak like a normal person_."

There was silence, save for Kiba's ragged breathing.

"...Hinata Hyuga," she said.

Gishiki said nothing at this, frowning as he peered at Hinata, wind rustling in the night. He then looked at Shino for moment, his critical eye cast over the Aburame's face, and then finally his eyes rested on Kiba.

"Ashinoura," he said.

Kiba stopped breathing so heavily, for a second absolutely stunned at what Gishiki had said. He then seemed to catch himself and went back to an almost-casual stance.

"Who?" he asked.

"There is no mistaking this," said Gishiki. "Destiny. It must be. The children of Hikari Hyuga and Ashinoura Inuzuka."

Kiba glared. Shino seemed once again without expression, but Gishiki told him:

"Oh, don't feel left out, Shino, everyone here is important. Her death was...clan-related, if you will."

Shino looked down, and Gishiki returned his focus to Kiba.

"He's alive, you know," he said. "I could tell you where he is."

Kiba scoffed at this.

"And what?" he said. "Let you kill my sensei? What do I care about him?"

Gishiki smiled.

"In that case, there's not much reason for me to stick around," he said. "This has been an enjoyable standoff, but I think it's time to wrap things up."

"Yeah," said Kiba, "I'd say so."

Shino and Hinata looked at him, then at each other.

"What do you mean, ye-"

Gishiki suddenly stopped dead in the middle of his sentence, a look of abject surprise on his face. He stared down at Kurenai, and experimentally punched at her. She disappeared in a cloud of smoke to reveal an empty table, save for three shuriken stuck onto it, holding a clump of hair. Turning around, Squad Eight saw the source of his confusion: a kunai in his back.

Kiba looked as confused as Gishiki. The other two turned to him, looking for an explanation.

"I was not expecting that," he said.

Gishiki turned back to look at him, and then shrieked with pain as Akamaru leapt from the darkness, spinning at an incredible speed, and slammed into his head, spilling blood all over the place and driving him into the ground.

"_That's_ what I was expecting," said Kiba. "Here, boy!"

The now somewhat red dog trotted over to Kiba and was pleased to receive a great flurry of pats as Shino and Hinata looked on, bemused at the turn of events. After a few tummy-rubs, Kiba looked up to see Kurenai at the table, standing, with a piece of her hair missing.

"Sensei!" called Hinata.

The squad ran to Kurenai as she leaned on the table.

"He liked the sound of his own voice, didn't he?" she said.

"I'm glad you showed up," said Kiba. "Wouldn't've wanted to fight that guy. Still, Akamaru took him out right, didn'tcha, boy?"

Kurenai nodded.

"Good work, Kiba. When'd you work it out?"

"Blood didn't smell right," he said.

Kurenai looked impressed, and Kiba beamed.

Hinata suddenly felt strange, and took a few seconds to realise it was jealousy. Kiba had figured out a plan for saving all of them when she could barely say "no" to the ninja. Shino had saved both of them from the jade-corpses. She had, in comparison, learned to do something that she should have known since she was six, and momentarily defied the enemy out of pride.

_I s-suppose that's a victory_, she thought.

Kurenai suddenly lost hold of the table and stumble, falling down onto it.

"Sensei?" asked Shino.

"H..he got me with a tranquiliser before," said Kurenai. "It's why I took so long to hit him with the knife from the tr-…"

She fell silent, and her eyes closed. Kiba felt at her neck.

"She's still alive," he said. "Either of you know much about medical stuff?"

"N-no," said Hinata.

"I have skimmed certain medical books," said Shino.

_Not surprised_, thought Hinata.

"She seems fine, but the tranquiliser could mean it will be some time before she wakes up."

"'Some time'?" asked Kiba.

"Possibly ten hours," Shino responded.

"Alright," said Kiba. "Let's get her out of here."

00000

They camped out in the woods then, a good way from Hisui village. It had been a hard job, dragging Kurenai out, but after careful adjusting of hands the three genin and Akamaru had moved her to where they'd left their stuff at Hisui's gate; they certainly weren't going back to the inn.

Now they sat around a fire in the shadow of great trees, all in contemplative silence, Kurenai under blankets.

Kiba, unsurprisingly, was the first to speak.

"Are you guys…" he began. "Are you okay?"

Shino looked up.

"Why?"

"W-well…" said Hinata. "What just happened d-doesn't normally happen to you, does it?"

Shino shook his head.

"Hm," he added.

"Shino," said Kiba. "He said you hated yourself."

"And?"

"And you didn't disagree with him," said Kiba.

The three went back to being silent for a few moments more, until finally Shino spoke again.

"I've been unwell lately," he said. "In the past few months, I have acted...different."

He looked at the others, who seemed confused.

"You haven't noticed?" he asked, not quite as devoid of emotion as he usually sounded.

"I haven't," admitted Hinata. "I'm s-sorry."

Shino looked down again.

"I thought how I acted made it obvious," he said.

"Shino," said Kiba, "we can't see your mouth and you wear sunglasses all the time. How could _you_ be obvious?"

Shino took a breath, and shut his eyes.

"The people of the Aburame clan are meant to always wear masks. Not literal masks, although our glasses do somewhat perform that function. In public, we are supposed to always remain stoic. Even in the face of death. My teachers say I have great potential to be almost completely unreadable, entirely unpredictable."

Kiba frowned.

"They want you to be emotionless?" he asked.

"No," said Shino. "Not emotionless. Having no emotions at all would be impossible. What I am meant to be is one who shows no emotion. They say it's what I'm brilliant at, what I was born to do. They say that I will be the perfect Aburame. They trained me from since when I was a child. I stayed away from everyone else, everyone outside my clan. They made it hard to keep focused; it was too easy to get caught up in their passions.

"Eventually, they stopped trying to see me, and they only saw my mask. I thought I'd succeeded. I was close to blank, closer to perfection than anyone had ever come before, then...My mother was killed in action. The mission was secret, so I don't know how. I may never. For a long time after she was dead, I worked even harder. I didn't want to feel anything anymore, and I thought it would be easier.

"Then I was put in your squad. You both spoke to me, looked at me, like nobody had in so many years. I thought I was a master of keeping my mind hidden, and like so many people before, I thought you only saw my mask. But you knew there was something behind it. I couldn't fool either of you, not entirely. I tried to be obvious, to show you that you were right, that there _is_ a person behind the mask that keeps the world away. I knew what I did were the smallest clues, but it was all I could hope for."

Shino opened his eyes again, and wondered how Hinata and Kiba were reacting. He had to pay attention to what they did. The unreadable man wasn't all that good at reading people himself.

"Why?" asked Kiba, a tone of harsh anger in him.

"Because you made me realise the truth," said Shino. "I don't want to be what they say I am. I don't want people to think I never cared about her."

Kiba and Hinata didn't cry then, although Shino thought he saw their eyes move in a strange way. They seemed sad, contemplative...perhaps empathetic. He could only guess at why.

"I'm sorry," Kiba said, finally. "For your mom dying. And for what your clan put you through."

"It's not their fault," said Shino. "They wanted to make me a better ninja."

"By making you friendless?"

Shino ruminated on this.

"That was...a side effect," he said.

Hinata said something that Shino couldn't hear.

"Hmm?" he said.

"Sh-shino…" she said, fingers twitching together. "I kn-know you're my s-squadmate and this is r-really personal b-but…c-c…can I hug you?"

"I'd rather you didn't," he responded.

He quickly saw this sadden Hinata further, and added:

"It's not that I don't appreciate it, but I don't like being touched."

"Okay," said Hinata, nodding acquiescence to this as Kiba seemed to think hard on something.

He raised his arm in a fist, facing Shino.

"Fist-bump?" he suggested.

Hinata and Shino looked at him like he had suggested that they steal the moon.

"Okay," said Kiba, "both of you, hold your hands up in a fist, like this."

They did so.

"Now make your knuckles touch each other."

They followed his instructions slowly, lightly tapping each other on the knuckles.

"No!" said Kiba. "Look, like this!"

He took Shino's fist from Hinata's, and moved it towards himself.

"Okay," he said, "back, then forward onto mine."

Shino followed this order as he said it, and carefully, they fist-bumped.

"There," said Kiba. "Now you two do it."

Hinata and Shino followed suit, Hinata smiling a little. Kiba then held up his fist, and they did so as well. Kiba felt how cold Hinata's skin was, and wondered if that was why she almost always wore a jacket.

"Cool," Kiba said.

Beneath his jacket collar, Shino felt himself smiling.

"So," said Kiba, turning to face Shino. "Were the bugs part of this 'perfect Aburame' thing?"

"No," said Shino. "Every Aburame clan member has kikai within their bodies, and to my knowledge, mine are not distinct from anybody else's in the clan."

"Wh-what can they do?" asked Hinata.

"They are immune to genjutsu, and as you have seen they can eat through vegetation quite quickly. I can also use them to track people, and they can function as sentries."

"Does it hurt when they come out of you?" asked Hinata.

"Only a little," said Shino. "The holes they make in my skin heal over almost instantly, and they are fairly small."

"Could you hide things inside you that way?" asked Hinata. "L-like, messages or something?"

Shino frowned.

"I suppose," he said. "But that would be an unusual use of the ability."

"And fillin' yourself up with bugs, yeah, that's totally normal," said Kiba.

Shino now turned to him, a little closer than before.

"How did you become connected with Akamaru?" he asked.

Kiba said, very cautiously:

"It's an Inuzuka thing."

"I ascertained as such," said Shino.

Kiba thought his words over carefully, then spoke.

"The Inuzuka clan breeds special ninja-dogs, or nin-dogs. Every member of the clan is bonded with a dog at around the onset of puberty. We share some senses, we're always together...like your bugs, kinda."

Hinata raised her hand a little. Shino and Kiba looked to her.

"U-um," she said, "I know it s-sounds strange, but I'm sure you've had Akamaru for a long time...when does puberty start?"

"In males, around eleven or twelve," said Shino.

"You've definitely h-had Akamaru for longer than a year," said Hinata.

Kiba looked away from them.

"Kiba," said Shino, in a voice more forceful than usual. "I have trusted you and Hinata with knowledge I would not divulge to any other sapient being, including my own father. Socially you should reciprocate-"

"_No_, okay!" said Kiba.

He hugged his knees and glared at Shino.

"Do you ever talk normal?" he asked.

"Every Aburame speaks this way," Shino responded.

The silence continued as Kiba fumed, glancing from Shino to Hinata reproachfully. When he spoke again, he sounded a lot older than a twelve-year old should have.

"I got Akamaru when I was eight. Okay? Kind of a break with clan tradition, but...there was only one fully-trained Inuzuka ninja then, and my mom's never cared all that much about tradition."

"What about your father?" asked Shino. "He was a ninja, yes?"

Kiba scooped up Akamaru from his sleeping position on the ground and held him close to his chest, stroking his head as Akamaru breathed.

"He left the village," he said.

"He left?" asked Hinata.

"Yeah," said Kiba. "My dad's been a missing-nin for around four years now. They've sent people to look for him, but he's never been caught. I think they've given up by now, though. I could've told 'em not to bother with that waste of resources from the start. His name's Ashinoura. I guess he's alive, if the guy in Hisui was telling the truth."

He thought more on this, then added, looking at Hinata:

"He mentioned your mom, too."

"Hikari Hyuga," said Shino.

"Is she-" Kiba asked.

"Dead?" said Hinata. "Yes. Not long after my sister was born."

"You have a sister?" asked Kiba. "Older or younger?"

Hinata frowned.

"…K-kiba, if my mother died after my _older_ sister was born, how could she give birth to me?"

Kiba thought this over.

"Oh yeah," he said.

For a little while, they sat and said nothing again, until Shino became too curious not to speak.

"What did Kiba say to you the day before we left for Hisui?" he asked Hinata.

"Hmm?"

"On the day that we left, you didn't want to say why you had glass on your shoulders," said Shino. "Kiba said 'I meant what I said yesterday'."

Kiba threw a stick on the fire, and said quietly:

"I said I'd be her older brother."

Shino turned his head.

"Why?"

"I'm l-like you," said Hinata.

Shino was unsure. Under his scrutiny, Hinata didn't seem all that much like him – fear seemed to rule her, as rebellion ruled Kiba. He didn't think he was like that at all. Nonetheless, he listened.

"The day we left," she said, "I tried to leave home early, but my father found me. He was in an office. He said I was worthless, that I could never succeed in becoming a n-ninja. He told me he would punish me. He said he was trying to make me sad enough to unlock another level of the Byakugan."

She rubbed her eyes.

"He s-succeeded. I developed another level of the Byakugan."

"..._what_?" said Shino.

Kiba and Hinata stared at him.

"You've _never_ shouted before," said Kiba.

"That doesn't make any sense at all," said Shino. "You can't learn a jutsu that way. He had no reason at all to do that.

"No," said Kiba. "That's one way.

"How?" asked Shino.

Kiba leaned on a tree, Akamaru on his lap. His feet were up, but he didn't look all that relaxed, something still hanging over his mind.

"Some jutsu," he said, "particularly dojutsu like Hinata's Byakugan, are unlocked by extremely strong emotions."

"I've never heard that fact," said Shino. "How do you know this?"

"It's how I bonded with Akamaru," said Kiba. "And, weird coincidence, _my_ dad brought that on too."

"I feel I should mention that my father is not evil," said Shino.

"Why?" asked Kiba.

"Well..." began Shino. "Yours seem to both be..."

"Assholes?" suggested Kiba.

Shino laughed a tiny fraction, a half-second of quiet chuckle. Kiba smiled.

_Finally_, he thought.

"I'd agree, from what data I've gathered so far," Shino said. "Are the jutsu in question compromised by the emotions?"

"What do you mean?" asked Kiba.

"You don't have problems with your bond with Akamaru because of whatever you felt when it happened?"

"No, he's my best friend," said Kiba. "It's not about what the emotion actually was, good or bad. It only matters that it's really strong."

"...Naruto!" Hinata said.

"Huh?" said Kiba, looking around.

"Hinata, Naruto couldn't possibly be here," said Shino.

"N-no," she said, "he triggered my Byakugan!"

Kiba and Shino froze.

_Don't say 'that's what she said', don't say 'that's what she said', don't say 'that's what she said'..._

"Ah..." said Shino. "...yes?"

Hinata looked down, twiddling her fingers.

"When I was y-young, in taijutsu class, I was fighting Sakura. Earlier that day Naruto told me he liked Sakura, and I g-got really upset. I'd been friends with him since the start of school, but I didn't understand why I was crying so much until I realised I was in love with him. And that was the first time I could use the Byakugan."

"Huh," said Kiba. "That's cool. Spiritual energy, see?"

Shino nodded.

00000

Later, when they had all found whatever blanket they could fit in and Hinata was asleep, Shino spoke again.

"Kiba?" he asked.

"What?"

"Do you think Hinata has erethism?"

Kiba looked confused.

"Ere-what now?"

"Erethism," Shino repeated. "Social anxiety and extreme timidity as caused by mercury poisoning."

Kiba looked at Shino sceptically.

"You think Hinata has _mercury poisoning_?"

"Do you have a better explanation?" responded Shino.

"Yeah," said Kiba, "her clan's really strict, from what I can tell. I've heard things about them from my mom and sister...I mean, you've seen Hyuga, right?"

"Yes, and that's my point," said Shino. "Almost every Hyuga I have seen seems confident to a fault."

"Like Naruto?"

"No," said Shino. "I suspect Naruto speaks so highly of himself as a defence mechanism from his ill treatment socially. Why would the Hyuga have need of that? They wouldn't. So my question remains: why is Hinata so different from the rest of her clan?"

"I don't know," said Kiba. "I think she's a lot harder to figure out than most people think. Like you."

"Thankyou."

It was about thirty seconds when Shino spoke again.

"Kiba."

"What?"

"When did you know that Hinata was in love with Naruto?"

Kiba thought on this.

"I actually don't remember," he said. "Seems like I've known it my whole life. It's kinda nice, though; it's like the one thing in Konoha that's never ever gonna change. And I think she _gets_ Naruto more than all the other girls get Sasuke."

"Nobody gets Sasuke," said Shino.

"No, they don't," said Kiba. "Why? When'd you figure it out?"

"When she said so tonight."

Kiba looked at him.

"...what, seriously?"

"I wanted confirmation," answered Shino. "Based on intelligence I'd gathered, all signs pointed to yes, but I wanted a definite answer."

Kiba frowned.

"..._you_ don't like Hinata like that, right?"

"No," Shino responded. "Although in theory the idea should make sense. We are both fairly intelligent, both from allied clans, and she fits several human ideals of beauty. Her waist-hip ratio is zero point s-"

"I get it," said Kiba.

"Right."

Kiba waited, then asked:

"Waist-hip ratio..."

He smirked.

"Have you been-"

"No," said Shino, hastily.

Kiba laughed.

"Okay."

There was another silence.

"Do you?"

"Hmmm," Kiba thought, "Naah. I mean, she's pretty and all, but I like girls with more...pep."

"Pep?"

"You know...moxie?"

"Are you describing a girlfriend or a soft drink?"

"Shut up!"

00000

Action! Adventure! Angst! Romance! Bromance! This has been Memorium Activity with your bi-yearly update of _The Sun Kunoichi_!

I'd like to remind you all that I'm still looking for a beta, so please send in applications if you're interested. I have not looked everywhere, but I _have_ looked many places.


	7. Home

I haven't updated in so long because I was trapped in a facility full of killer robots that wanted to anaesthetize me with their hands, and also I am now a female Scottish redhead for some reason.

00000

_Chapter 7: Home_

The day seemed to have stretched on forever already, but to Ino Yamanaka's disappointment, it was still only eleven o'clock in the morning.

The past few days had been the least enjoyable Ino had ever experienced. Being in a squad with anyone other than - she mentally sighed happily, as usual, before thinking his name - _Sasuke Uchiha_ felt like a personal offence to her. It was as if the universe had slighted her, sticking her in the squad with Choji and Shikamaru.

She knew it was something of a village tradition. Their fathers were all friends and had been since long before she could remember; they were in a squad as genin, and as chunin, and even now as specialists they were almost always called in together. Ino was pretty sure not a month in her life had gone by when she hadn't either been looked after by Shikamaru's mother or Choji's uncle or whatever, or her mother had been caring for the boys. But tradition was no reason to saddle her with those two. Any talent their fathers had had clearly not been passed on!

What was she supposed to do with them, anyway? Being put in with _anyone_ else would have been better. She would have gladly shouldered the burden of explaining to Naruto or Kiba why and how they were wrong (about whatever) if it meant being in a squad with Sasuke. And that wasn't just because she loved him, it was because he was the best genin in Konoha if not the world, and he was going to be (in order) the best chunin, the best boyfriend, the best jonin, the best husband _and_ the best Hokage in history.

Ino knew she was going to be a jonin; that was something she'd decided years and years ago. She'd spent enough time in her family's flower shop selling two hundred-dollar bouquets for people that didn't appreciate it (and not getting paid _at all_) to realise she didn't want to be a shinobi's wife like her mother. She had no idea why anyone would pick flowers over ninja-work. Flowers were pretty sometimes and some of them smelled nice, but she'd pulled too many aphids out from her fingernails to consider them romantic anymore.

No, she was going to be Sasuke's partner. Not just girlfriend or wife (although, _obviously_, both of those things were going to happen as well), but partner, in as many senses of the word as possible. To be somebody's partner, you had to be their equal. She had to be as driven as Sasuke, as strong as Sasuke. She was not going to let him leave her in the dust he inevitably kicked up when he ran by, pushed along by whatever lonely destiny that made him the last Uchiha alive. She was going to be alongside him, and maybe, eventually, even be ahead of him.

Ino smiled to herself at the idea. Sasuke's serious nature was part of what made him attractive, but she also thought he could do with learning how to lose. And Ino knew how to lose, gracefully and with the understanding that this was a momentary pothole on the long road of destiny. Did she complain when Sakura sometimes beat her at taijutsu or in tests? No. Never. Well, a little bit, but not really badly.

Her eyes thinned as she thought of Sakura and Sasuke on the same team. Had they ditched Naruto at the first chance and gotten...close? Of course not. That was impossible, in Ino's estimation. Sakura didn't have enough nerve, and Sasuke probably had too much. Or maybe he didn't have enough heart. Or something. (And Naruto would have followed them around like a small, very confused dog.)

"Hey," said Choji, "Ino. You know about flowers and stuff, right?"

Pulled out of her reverie, Ino looked to Choji, clutching at a bag of chips, and involuntarily frowned a little. They had been walking through Konoha for the past ten minutes, looking for Asuma-sensei, who had gone off to get supplies and had not yet returned.

"What?" she asked.

Choji made a face, and then said nothing.

"Nah," he said. "You're mad about something."

He plucked a chip from his packet.

"You'll only get angry with me if I ask now," he said. "Never mind."

Ino growled in frustration.

"See?" said Choji, gesturing with the chip.

Ino shook her head and glared at Shikamaru, who was somehow managing to avoid bumping into anything even though he was still watching the clouds.

_Why is he doing that? Did he not get enough time to slack off properly this morning, so he has to make up for it on the move_?

"Do you two do this on purpose?" she asked, growing steadily more annoyed.

Shikamaru lazily looked past his right elbow to Ino's aggravated facial expression, and raised an eyebrow.

"I didn't do anything," he pointed out.

"YOU HAVEN'T DONE ANYTHING _ALL DAY_!"

Watching their squadmate throw her hands up in frustration, Shikamaru and Choji gave each other a little nod in honour of a successful Ino-annoying session. You had to do something to keep yourself entertained, particularly in this squad. Clouds and chips were fine, as these things go, but annoying Ino was an artform that Choji and Shikamaru had already begun to perfect.

As they walked by the village gate, it opened with a loud groan. Ino quickly forgot to be annoyed and ran a finger through her hair in case it was Squad Seven, but then she calmed down when she saw that it was Squad Eight. They looked tired, all scratched and haggard from whatever mission they'd just been on. As they approached, Ino noticed that there were red flecks all over Akamaru's coat; was that blood? Had a squad of one goofball, one major introvert and...Shino gotten into a serious fight?

Their sensei led the squad towards Ino, and she wondered what the rules were for talking with other people's sensei. Fortunately, Shikamaru seemed to remember, as he put a hand in his pocket and casually waved.

"Morning, Kurenai-sensei," he said.

Kiba looked confused at this greeting, and rubbed at his eyes.

"It's morning?" he asked.

"'Round eleven o'clock," said Shikamaru.

The dog-nin shook his head.

"Weird," he said. "We got home pretty fast, huh Shino?"

Shino nodded. The ability to use his kikai in front of the rest of the squad made travelling through the forest a lot easier; it was probably why they'd gotten home so much faster this time.

"So, why aren't you with Asuma-san?" asked Kurenai.

Kiba and Hinata both smiled a little behind Kurenai's back, and Ino giggled for a moment. Kurenai then looked at her, sort of sternly, and she quickly coughed to disguise the laughter.

"We're looking for him," said Shikamaru. "He went off to get supplies, but he didn't come back."

"Okay," said Kurenai. "I'll tell you if I see him."

Shikamaru nodded, and Choji and Ino followed him as they walked off into the village once more, their pace quite slow. Breathing out a little, Kurenai wiped sweat from her forehead and addressed her squad.

"You've all done an incredible job," she said. "Particularly for your first mission. Even if it did end up being cut short, every one of you performed amazingly under pressure. I'm going to recommend you to the Hokage himself."

Here, their eyes pricked up.

"What for?" asked Kiba. "Like, special missions or something?"

"Is it Chunin exams?" asked Shino.

_Exams?_ thought Hinata. _We barely just became genin..._

"Yes," said Kurenai, "I'm recommending you all for the next Chunin exams. They're a practical test of your skills as ninja, in a squad and alone. You'll be competing with other genin from all over the world. It's not just a chance to go up a level, it's also a way to show your talents and the strength of the village."

"And...you want us to go?" asked Kiba, rubbing Akamaru's head. "I don't know if we can do that right now, sensei. I mean, we're awesome, and everything, but..."

He glanced at Hinata and Shino, then himself.

"...I'm not sure any of us are ready to handle something that hard."

Hinata stared at him in bewilderment.

"_You're_ r-rejecting a challenge?"

"I'm not rejecting it!" he protested, raising his hands. "Just…"

He put Akamaru on his shoulder and rubbed at his hair.

"...I think we should all think this over for a while," he finished.

Kurenai's eyes went over the squad, all still looking determined despite everything that had happened to them. For their first C-rank, and their first time leaving the village, it'd been a hell of a mission. And yet, she noticed new things that morning. Shino seemed a lot less reserved, casually using his kikai in front of Kiba and Hinata without any apparent qualms. Kiba was also looking a lot happier, and he and Shino had spoken a lot more that morning than they had before. They'd made definite progress.

Hinata, on the other hand, was more distracted than usual. When she was with the others, she acted normally, and spoke to Shino almost as much as Kiba did, but Kurenai had seen the look on her face when they were walking along. Something was troubling her, and she needed to work it out before the squad was going to join the exam. The plan, then, was obvious.

_If they get on better when I'm not around_, thought Kurenai, _then I need to go_.

"I'd better head back to the Hokage's office," said Kurenai. "The Hokage will need my report on what happened at Hisui as soon as possible."

The boys seemed to quietly accept this, but then Hinata seemed to snap out of a reverie and said:

"S-sensei?"

"Yes, Hinata?"

She folded her arms, looking downward.

"D-did we fail our mission?" she asked.

Kurenai thought.

"No," she said. "It changed parameters. Missions do that, although I didn't expect a C-rank mission to fall apart like that one did. They're not usually so difficult, but all of you recovered well."

The squad all nodded again, and Kurenai suspected they were getting bored of her praising her. She hoped they didn't pester her for missions as eventful as the last had been. A ninja was not supposed to be an adrenaline junkie. Then again, they were probably all tired; it had been a long way back home, even with Shino's kikai to clear the way.

"Anyway," said Kurenai, "I suggest all of you go home and shower."

There was an awkward silence as the three children seemed to wake up and all frowned in confusion, and Kurenai mentally facepalmed.

"...sensei?" asked Hinata, cautiously.

"Uh," Kurenai said, "because…that's a good idea in general."

They still all said nothing.

"…I'll see you all tomorrow," said Kurenai. "We'll discuss whether you're going to compete in the Chunin Exams then."

She left the three, not bothering to chakra-jump out of tiredness. They watched her go, then almost instinctively formed a kind of circle, walking over to a tree on a hill near the main gate, Shino sitting down at the roots.

"So," Kiba said, leaning against the tree, "do we wanna be chunin?"

Hinata fiddled with her bag-strap.

"What do you w-want?" she asked.

"Huh?"

"I m-mean, do _you_ want to be a chunin?"

Kiba shrugged.

"Chunin get paid more," he said. "More perks, wider missions…harder missions. Probably more work, as well. Still, though…"

He trailed off, staring out into the distance.

"…what?" asked Shino.

"What?" said Kiba.

"You just t-trailed off there," said Hinata. "When you were talking about the exams."

Kiba pushed back against the tree, folding his arms.

"So?" he said.

"So, that is probably significant," said Shino. "Why else would you have trailed off like that? You-"

"Maybe I couldn't think of anything else to say," said Kiba. "Not everything I talk about is really important, you know."

Shino looked to Hinata, eyebrows raised, and she could only shrug in response.

_If Kiba is going to be this obstinate, we will simply have to try different methods,_ thought Shino. _I mean, it's simple courtesy. He knows our secrets; we should know some of his._

The conversation apparently over, Hinata sat at the roots of the tree, next to Shino and Kiba. It was nice sitting there with them, even if neither seemed willing to talk. She wondered if this was what having brothers felt like. Well, Neji _could_ be considered her brother, but she really didn't think of him that way.

It'd be hard for her, in the exams. Even with the knowledge that she could now use Gentle Fist effectively enough to take somebody down, Hinata had no certainty of whether she could make it in the Chunin Exams. If the rest of the world's ninja were as strong as Gishiki…

_I need to train more_, she thought.

There was no more space in the squad for someone who kept clinging on to the past, and she had no more time to be weak. If the world was as rough as Hisui, even at only C-rank missions, Hinata only had two options: become more powerful, or give up being a ninja.

Inside her jacket pocket, her fists clenched.

_I need to get stronger_.

Then, a shadow passed over the tree, blocking the sunlight that had seemed to wash over Hinata's face.

It was Hiashi.

Immediately they stood, all three of them, even though Hinata didn't tell Kiba and Shino to. Maybe it was the sheer presence of Hiashi that made them do it, as if to present a greater threat against the imposing clan leader. Maybe it was from a respect born out of fear; Hinata, at least, had been trained to defer to Hiashi. Regardless, they stood, even as his shadow covered Hinata the most.

"Lord Hiashi," said Shino, bowing a little.

This was not a formality of the Hyuga clan, but Hiashi seemed pleased with this.

"Shino," he said, giving a thin smile to Shino as another point of etiquette.

Hiashi did not acknowledge Kiba, but Hinata expected little else, and apparently, neither did Kiba, who seemed to slump a little in comparison to Shino's ramrod-straight posture. Kiba using his own informality as a defence, the same thing he'd done when they'd faced off with Gishiki. He was not actually relaxed, but he knew looking like he was somehow disturbed Hiashi. By pretending to be relaxed, he somehow relaxed himself.

"Your mission..." said Hiashi, addressing Hinata. "It succeeded?"

Hinata averted her eyes from her father's, and decided to just nod sharply. Hiashi quietly accepted this, and waved at a patch of dirt on her t-shirt with a flick of his hand, the folds of his sleeve swaying a little with the movement.

"I have heard..."

His eyes quickly flicked to Shino, then Kiba, and then back to a spot near Hinata's head.

"..._rumours_ about the squad you were chosen for. _Abilities_. Connections to the unsavoury."

For a brief second, Hinata thought she saw Kiba scowl at Hiashi, but then the look disappeared, and he acted casual as ever. Hiashi seemed to notice as well, and paused to stare at Kiba. There followed a few seconds of this, then Hiashi went back to speaking.

"Naturally," he said, "you cannot avoid certain eventualities. If you wish to become a village ninja, you must accept what the Academy and the Hokage Council considers just. However, how you act outside of work hours is your own choice. What you do when not involved in the matters of the village directly affects the Hyuga."

She swallowed a lump in her throat.

_He knows_.

He knew, at the very least, that she was friends with Anko; neither had tried to hide that in all the years they'd known each other. That would be difficult to justify to him. She knew what Hyuga clan members liked in a person, particularly a woman, and she also knew that Anko was basically the opposite of those ideals.

He may have found out about the _Real Ninja Stories_, or the various other hobbies she'd kept hidden from the clan. She'd kept them secret because they were considered 'unsuitable for the clan leader's daughter', but considering she wasn't exactly held in high esteem by the council, she probably wouldn't actively be punished for that.

There was only really one major problem.

_Does he know about Naruto?_

"As a consequence," said Hiashi, "I will warn you now: unless it is required of you by your work as a village ninja, you are not to associate with anyone outside the Hyuga clan by yourself."

They all breathed in, and Hinata held her breath to stop herself from sobbing.

She thought about it. She thought about him, and his eyes, and his tall shadow, and how he looked like Neji. She saw how he looked like her, and how she wasn't ready to go home, and how home was where her mother was, and how she wanted her to be there for even a second, just so she knew she wasn't going to fall in line and grow into another Hyuga woman that never left the compound without permission. She wondered at the slow disappearing of even the memories of her mother, of Anko, of any friendship she might have found with Kiba and Shino. It would be gone.

She knew she was crying, and she didn't care that she couldn't stop it, because she didn't want to stand in front of Hiashi and quietly accept what he told her ever again. That was over. That had been over for a long time, and she had realised it there, on that hill, at the roots of the tree.

"F-father…"

She looked up into his eyes, and glared.

"No."

Hiashi's eyes widened, and he seemed dazed for a second, as if Hinata had actually landed a blow on him.

"What?" he said.

"I w-won't follow that order," said Hinata. "I'm g-going to be friends with whoever I want."

"Do not be petulant, Hinata," said Hiashi. "You have defied me before, and I have been lenient with your transgressions-"

"So you admit it, Lord Hiashi?" asked Kiba.

All eyes flew to the Inuzuka, who leaned back on the tree, Akamaru on his shoulder, and said, staring at his fingernails:

"Hinata's tried to break away from you before," he said. "_Probably_ because you purposely bullied her to the point of crying just to give her a higher level in the Byakugan, not to mention a whole bunch of other stuff. That count as against any rules, Shino?"

Shino pushed down on his jacket so as to smooth it out.

"My knowledge of Konoha law is limited," he admitted, "but, as far as I can remember, it could easily fall under abuse laws, reasonable training laws, and the role of Lord Hiashi as Hinata's legal guardian. No doubt Lord Hiashi will be able to finance an excellent legal squad if the matter reaches court, but how will the rest of the village react when they discover how the Hyuga have treated Hinata?"

"Who is," said Kiba, "and let's face it, the only member of your clan _without_ a giant pole up their ass."

Hinata tried desperately to avoid smiling as she turned back to find out Hiashi's reaction. His expression was fairly measured by the standards of anyone outside the Hyuga, but Hinata knew that he was furious at what the three of them had said.

"So," he said, with a tranquil face. "You have chosen this."

In that moment, Hinata heard her father's normally stern voice wobble a little, and she thought that there was a tinge of regret in there. She didn't think it was a lie, either. She'd genuinely made him lose control.

"Yes," she said.

He nodded his head the tiniest amount, and then he turned away, swift as a change in the breeze, until he was over a hill and out of their sight.

Turning the opposite way, Hinata began to walk. She didn't tell Kiba and Shino to follow, but they fell in after her, all three children silent, the only sound they made the shaking of their backpacks and the crunching sound of the leaves beneath their sandalled feet.

Shino spoke first.

"Hinata," he said, "your father is _terrifying_."

"Yeah," said Kiba. "I was probably more scared there than I was of Gishiki. I can't believe I actually said all that stuff to him…where'd he learn to glare like tha-"

He finished with a slight yelp of surprise as Hinata swivelled around, holding out two clenched fists.

"Woah!" said Kiba. "...what?"

"I w-want to hug you both right now but I know you d-don't like that Shino s-so can we please squad fist-bump like we d-did before?"

Kiba and Shino immediately did so, so quickly as to make it hurt a little. Then Kiba stepped forward and hugged Hinata, Akamaru also joining in by rubbing his nose against her ear. They let go, and stood there, staring out into the village.

"Thankyou," she said. "It t-took me almost my entire life to say that to my father, and you two said everything the f-first time you met him."

"Yeah, well," said Kiba, "I dunno if you hear much from people in your clan, but Inuzukas kind of hate the Hyuga. I'd heard my mom talk about Hiashi all the time, so…not that big a deal."

Shino rubbed a hand against his chin.

"I doubt my clan will welcome what I have said," he said. "We are meant to hold strong relations with the Hyuga. However, I stand by my statement."

"Your clan?" asked Kiba. "The ones that made you give up emotions?"

"It's a little more complicated than that," said Shino.

"Okay," said Kiba.

He turned to Hinata.

"Where now?"

Truth be told, she had no idea. She'd only been walking because she wanted to be as far away from Hiashi as possible. It was logical to her, and it had always been so: whenever she wanted to escape the councillors, or Neji, or her father, she'd always gone away from the compound. The happiest she'd felt when she was at home was training outside, on the edge of the forest, where every limitation they'd placed on her was gone in the face of what she could do.

Maybe that was the right way for her. She was no longer worried that the world outside was filled with people like Gishiki. It was better out there than in the compound, no matter how dangerous, because outside, she could fight back.

She had a home to find.

"Anko," she said.

00000

Hinata knocked for some time at the apartment door before Anko answered.

"Hinata?" she said, opening the door. "Are…you okay?"

The younger kunoichi tried to say something, but instead stepped inside and hugged Anko, who looked surprised before accepting it.

"May we enter?" asked Shino.

Anko looked at both of them carefully.

"Yeah," she said, and held the door open.

It took some time for Anko to get the story out of the three of them. Hinata told most of what had happened in the four days they'd been gone, interrupted only occasionally by Kiba or Shino to clarify something. They didn't lie about what happened, but Hinata skipped over the details of the long night when Kurenai was unconscious. When Hinata ended with what she had said to Hiashi, Anko pulled herself from the couch and stood.

"W-what is it?" asked Hinata.

"Doorbell," said Anko. "You all stay here."

She left, Kiba watching her leave, and Hinata frowned.

"What?" asked Shino.

"…I didn't see a doorbell," she said.

Kiba laughed, and they looked at him.

"You handle Gishiki and your dad _perfect_," he said, "and then you get annoyed by the fact you missed Anko has a doorbell."

"I guess," said Hinata.

"You guess?" Kiba raised an eyebrow. "Hinata, I know you've never left the village, so Gishiki was new, but have you ever told your dad to go to hell before?"

Hinata shook her head.

"What about you?" he said to Shino.

"You mean, have I ever conflicted with my father?" said Shino. "No."

He poked at a grass stain on his jacket, and then added:

"Not my mother either."

"You should," said Kiba. "With your dad."

"I like my father," said Shino.

"So?" asked Kiba. "I like my mom, doesn't mean I don't fight with her sometimes. Lot of times. Most of the time. If you don't ever fight with your parents, you get problems later. You have to have little fights so all the anger doesn't turn into one giant fight down the track."

"Like what j-just happened?" asked Hinata.

"Exactly."

"So," said Shino, "you're saying an authoritarian system should have some kind of method of release of tensions between classes?"

Kiba thought on this, then asked Hinata:

"Am I?"

"Yes," said Hinata. "I think."

"Hrrm," said Shino, shaking his head, and they all smiled again.

"Anyway," said Kiba, his fingers around Akamaru's collar, "you've done a lot of stuff lately, Hinata. Ever since we got put in a squad, you've been getting better and better."

This was news to Hinata.

"N-no, I haven't," she said.

"Yeah," said Kiba. "Count 'em: you can use your clan's taijutsu now, you just told your dad _exactly_ what you think of him, and you did so good at last mission you could do Chunin Exams. I'd call that pretty good for someone who graduated the Academy barely a month ago."

Hinata blushed.

"I'm n-not that good," she said. "I d-don't even know if Gentle Fist will work on people who aren't zombies."

"Jade Clones," corrected Shino. "And you're also very good at chakra-jumping."

"Chakra-jumping high isn't much of a talent," said Hinata.

"But it is a talent," said Shino, even as she shook her head more.

"Ah, forget it," said Kiba. "Obviously, Hinata's greatest jutsu is the ability to deny she's awesome."

They spoke no more of this, because Anko returned to the room, and soon after accidentally drinking beer in front of them she suggested they each shower in turn. Hinata was first, so once that was done, she spent the rest of the time talking to Anko and thinking things over.

Anko wouldn't always be there. That was a fact of ninja-life: she had missions to complete, often long ones in lands very far away, and she couldn't take care of Hinata like a parent would. What was more, Hinata suspected that her father and the clan would make a case against Anko on the grounds she was unfit to be a parent. Hinata knew the contents of the jonin's fridge (ramen, milk, beer, chocolate) and wardrobe (five identical pieces of chainmail, several skirts, approximately seventy-three odd socks), and believed that the strain of eating vegetables and dressing like a responsible adult would be difficult if not impossible for Anko. She was her older sister, not her mother.

Shino entered as Kiba left for the shower, still wearing his sunglasses, clothes impeccably neat and hair oddly springy-looking. He sat down in front of Hinata.

"What're our options?" he asked.

Hinata blinked.

"Our?" she said.

"Right now, you are in a safe place," said Shino. "Village law would require co-operation between village ninja and Hyuga ninja to search Anko's house, and that would be assuming Anko would play by the rules while they did so."

He pushed his sunglasses up, and added:

"Not that I would hold any such actions against her."

"None taken," said Anko as she walked past.

"…yet," said Shino, "if Anko-san won't be here often, it would be difficult to claim she is your legal guardian, and it would be unsafe for you to remain here anyway."

"And you might have trouble with your c-clan," said Hinata.

"That is a distant second in comparison to your predicament," Shino said.

"You s-said '_our_ options'," Hinata pointed out.

Shino paused at this.

"Regardless," he said.

Hinata waited for him to keep going, but guessed that Shino considered 'Regardless' to constitute a full sentence by himself. She wondered how much he was hiding when he acted so dismissive, but at least it was better than 'hrrm'.

A few more minutes passed, and Kiba returned, still clutching Akamaru to his side. He sniffed at the dog, and wrinkled his nose.

"I should get him cleaned up," he said.

"Not here," said Anko. "Only _I_ get human blood on my shower!"

The boys both did a double-take at this, but Hinata ignored it (Anko said things like that more or less all the time) and asked Kiba where he'd do it.

"Home," he said. "Doesn't really matter if it smells like wet dog there. Thanks for letting me use your shower, Anko."

"That's okay!" said Anko. "I'm sure you'd all do the same for me."

Kiba turned a tiny bit red as Hinata resisted the urge to bury her face in her hands. Once that feeling was over, she watched Kiba walk over to his bag and drag it up from the floor, shoving old clothes into it. He pulled it up to his back, put it on, and stood there, looking expectantly at Hinata and Shino.

"Well, come on," he said.

They stared at him.

"I'm not just leavin' you two here," said Kiba.

"Very well," said Shino. "But where are we going?"

Kiba hitched up his backpack.

"You said we needed a safe place," he said. "We're going to my house."

00000

Kiba led them through the village on a winding path, sniffing the air now and again and changing his direction. The day had gotten quite hot since they'd reached Anko's house, so they kept to the shadows, walking under trees as they picked their way through Konoha's streets to get to Kiba's house. Hinata knew Kiba was purposely keeping her away from the Hyuga compound, and he also seemed to be avoiding getting too close to other Hyuga that were out and about. Hinata didn't think it was much of a problem; the only ones out at this time of day were branch-house Hyuga.

_And they probably won't like me even if I am out of the clan now_.

It was then, in the middle of the road, that Hinata saw him. Neji was walking beside two other genin and a tall man with a bright green jacket and a black bowl-cut. In front of him was a very tall boy about Neji's age, dressed much like the sensei except with massive eyes and thick eyebrows. The girl in the squad had her hair in buns, and appeared to be carrying a not inconsiderable amount of weapons on her.

Hinata hoped that he wouldn't notice her, but Neji stopped walking when he caught her eye, and the rest of his squad stopped too. Too close to avoid each other, Hinata went to the squad, Kiba and Shino following. She nervously bowed slightly to Neji.

"G-good afternoon, Neji," she said.

Neji made no change of expression to suggest he accepted the greeting, as if it had never been said at all. The tall boy spoke for him.

"Neji? Do you know this girl?"

Neji still said nothing, and indeed neither did anyone else until Kiba.

"Isn't a neji a kind of onion?" he asked.

Glaring at him, Neji remained tight-lipped until he finally spoke.

"You are thinking of _negi_," he said.

"Oh," said Kiba, "right. Are you Hinata's brother?"

"..."

"C-cousin," Hinata broke in. "Our f-fathers were...twins."

_**Were**_, thought Shino. _I suppose Hinata's uncle died. Perhaps Hiashi had something to do it, which may be why Neji dislikes Hinata._

Shino looked at the boy and girl in Neji's squad. Judging by their reactions, neither of them they didn't know about this side of Neji either.

"Are you Kurenai's squad?" asked the tall man.

"Yes, sensei," said Shino. "I am Shino Aburame. This is Kiba Inuzuka and Hinata Hyuga."

"I've met your father," said the sensei. "I'm Might Guy, sensei to Squad Nine. Neji you've met. This is Tenten and Rock Lee."

"Thankyou, Guy-sensei!" said Lee, "I am honoured to meet you all, and I am certain we will all do well in the Chunin exams!"

"And are they taking part in the Chunin exams?" Neji asked Lee, gesturing to Squad Eight.

Hinata saw the look in his eye, and almost out of spite she immediately said:

"Yes."

Then she put a hand to her mouth as she suddenly realised what she'd just said. Nervously looking to Shino and Kiba, apologetic, she was relieved to discover they both seemed fine with this turn of events.

"Yes," Shino confirmed. "We are participating in those."

"Excellent!" said Lee.

"No doubt you're off to work out your training schedule," said Guy. "We've been at it for a year."

Kiba did a double-take.

"A year?" he said. "You've been training for a year?"

"These three graduated from the Academy last year," said Guy. "I've waited some time before I applied them for the Chunin exams, just to make sure they were ready."

"And we are ready!" said Lee.

"Not that we were in doubt," said Tenten. "Neji got the highest marks in the class."

The look of loathing on his face giving way to something approaching smugness, Neji gave the slightest nod to Tenten, and looked at Shino.

"I presume you received highest?" he asked.

Shino's fists clenched inside his jacket pockets.

"...no."

"Oh," said Neji.

The kikai suddenly rustled inside of Shino.

_No, _he thought at them,_ we can't do that._

They rustled inquisitively.

_Because firstly, that is morally questionable,_ he thought,_ and secondly, there are four witnesses._

"We haven't just been training, though," said Tenten. "Sometimes we do missions as well."

"Cool," said Kiba, and he added, smiling at her, "maybe we'll all pass and do missions together."

Tenten blushed slightly and looked away as the smug look on Neji's face immediately evaporated and he scowled at Kiba. Hinata coughed nervously and poked Kiba with her foot; whether he noticed or not, he didn't speak to Tenten again.

"But we have trained more than anyone else in our year!" said Lee, apparently not noticing.

"So?" asked Neji. "The only other squad our age is Squad Eleven. I doubt we will have much competition."

His eyes flicked over to Hinata's, and she held his gaze.

"We should get back to training," said Guy, now sounding a little less enthused than before.

"Right," said Kiba, stepping aside to let them pass.

They walked by and had almost turned the corner when Hinata said, not shouting but still louder than usual:

"Neji. There is s-someone who could challenge you."

The squad turned around, curiosity peaked. Neji said nothing, but at least seemed to pay attention.

"Sasuke," said Hinata. "S-sasuke Uchiha. He got the highest marks in our class overall. He's the best we have."

Neji suddenly looked interested as Tenten spoke.

"But..." she said, "aren't the Uchiha all...gone?"

"Was that before or after they died?" asked Kiba.

Hinata turned away from Neji to glare at him a little bit, in response to which he raised his hands and backed off a little.

"I see," said Neji, and left them.

As he went, Lee and Tenten followed. Guy looked a little sternly at Kiba for a moment, then walked away with them.

"So that's your cousin," said Kiba as they began to walk again. "No wonder you didn't mention him before."

"We're n-not very close," Hinata explained.

"If he's older than you, and presumably his father is dead, why isn't he the clan heir?" asked Shino. "I assumed the Hyuga worked on a system of primogeniture."

"What?" said Kiba.

"Primogeniture," said Shino. "The eldest male child is the heir."

"Huh," said Kiba. "Guess I haven't read that on my word-calendar yet."

"No," Hinata said. "Neji's father was..."

She considered explaining the entire complicated set-up of the Hyuga clan, but then decided against it.

"...it's c-complicated," she finished.

Shino looked to Kiba as he walked along.

"Do you have something against the Uchiha?" he asked.

"Besides him being an overpowered elitist asshole?" said Kiba.

"No, I meant the clan in general."

Kiba shrugged.

"Nah," he said. "Not much point in bearing a grudge. They're all dead and I'm not. Here we are."

He stood outside what seemed at first to be a small park filled with tall trees, hidden behind a somewhat rusted-over gate. Then he leant down to the lock, sniffed it carefully, and said aloud:

"Peachwood."

The lock made a cracking noise and a little puff of smoke burst out of the hole, but this was apparently what was meant to happen, because the gate swung open after this little display. Casually walking inside, Kiba stopped next to a small metal box. Taking Akamaru down off his shoulder and put his hand inside the box, he pulled out a small wooden block with what looked like an explosive tag on it and put it inside the lock of the gate.

"W-why peachwood?" asked Hinata as they began to walk up the path through the trees.

"That's what it was," said Kiba. "Every block there's a different kind of wood. Since we can smell better than most people, we can tell without looking at it, and that's the gate."

"It also keeps away ghosts," said Shino.

They stared at him.

"Peachwood," he said. "It's a magically potent tree."

"What," said Kiba, "_you_ believe in magic?"

"No," said Shino. "I simply find knowing these things useful."

The path came to an end at a little stone fence, which Kiba casually stepped over. A little way beyond was a house in front of a hill, surrounded by a field of grass. Behind the hill and around the field was a forest of trees so thick it was as dark as night even in the bright sunshine of the hot day.

Hinata turned around and noticed that she couldn't see her way back to Konoha, then looked back at the field and realised there was no wall around the forest.

"Wh..." she began. "Where's the wall?"

The other two stopped walking through the field and turned back for her.

"Right there," said Kiba, pointing at the tiny stone fence.

"No," said Hinata, "the wall. The village wall. The one that goes around the..."

She looked down, and finished:

"...v-village."

"That would be what the forest is for," said Kiba, picking up Akamaru. "Come on, I'll explain on the way."

Running to catch up with them, Hinata fell in step beside Shino and Kiba and listened as the Inuzuka explained, holding Akamaru above the long grass.

"Remember how I said my clan wasn't there at the founding of Konoha?" he said. "Well, it took us a while to get into the village as an official clan, but eventually we got there and got given a little plot of land. We got about as much as the Akimichi or the Yamanaka did, before they sold most of their stuff for houses."

He stepped over what looked like an old well and kept explaining.

"Then, we got too big," said Kiba. "Inuzuka's not really a family name. When we got to Konoha, there were about four families in the clan; pretty soon after, there were about twelve. And I'm talkin' _big_ families, up to great grandparents, all living in a space way too small for 'em.

"So the village gave us a new bit of land just on the edge of the village. Part of Konoha's wall got destroyed in the First Great Shinobi World War, and they tried fixing it by growing a huge-ass forest around where the gate used to be."

He looked back at them and grinned.

"Problem was, it grew too much. Trees started spreading into the village itself. So they figured, tell the Inuzuka to handle it, and they can have whatever land they can get back from the Living Forest."

He pointed around him in a wide sweep of the field.

"Back when mom was a kid, all of this was buildings," said Kiba. "We had a compound, like the Nara or the Hyuga. Then, one night during the Third War, whole thing burned down."

Shino frowned.

"Why?" he asked.

"No idea," said Kiba. "And that's not just me not bothering to find out, I mean _nobody_ knows. One, how'd anybody get past the Living Forest to reach the compound in the first place, two, how'd they set the entire thing on fire so fast, and three: why? Enough Inuzuka'd died in the war already; the place was basically empty 'cept for kids and old people."

"So the forest keeps people out?" asked Hinata.

"Yeah," said Kiba. "Better than any stone wall, trust me. Well, here we are."

They had reached a series of wooden steps that led up to the house, which was also made of quite roughly-hewn timber. It seemed to be cut into the hill, as if part of it were underground, even though it looked quite big for so few people.

Shino pointed to the left at a series of small huts surrounded by a large wire fence.

"What's that?" he asked.

"We keep the dogs we breed there," he said. "The wire's so they don't escape into the field or the forest. There's not that many of them right now; not many people want our dogs bred for 'em, and we don't use many anymore."

Akamaru barked.

"Yeah, you were born there," said Kiba, "when I was tiny and you were even tinier."

Putting down the dog, who ran up the stairs and waited patiently at the door, he looked back at Shino and Hinata.

"Come up the stairs," he said, "but not too far up 'em. My mom'll be pissed if I tell her what we said to Hiashi, so I'll say I did most of it and she can yell at me for a while, then you two come up and she can't be mad because you're guests."

"Foolproof," commented Shino, and Kiba nodded.

"Great."

He ran up the stairs, opened the door and entered, leaving it unlocked behind him. Creeping up slowly, Hinata and Shino waited on a middle stair, just high enough to see what was going on.

A short woman came around the corner of the hallway, wearing a jonin jacket and tracksuit pants. She was quite stocky with short, wild hair like Kiba's.

"Kiba?" she said.

"Hey, mom," said Kiba.

"Did you guys have a good mission?" she asked.

At first Hinata thought Kiba's mother had seen them, but then she realised she was talking to Akamaru as well as Kiba, the little dog barking happily as Kiba thought about her question.

"It was...new," said Kiba. "Uh, anyway, mom, we...might have _done_ something when we got home."

She crossed her arms.

"What?"

"Uhhh..."

"_What?_"

"I..._kind_ of might have accidentally told Hiashi Hyuga to go screw himself because he's a dick to Hinata."

She stared at him for a few seconds, then bodily picked him up and hugged him, moving Kiba around like he was a ragdoll.

"I'm _so proud_ of you, Kiba! You're carrying on the Inuzuka tradition!"

"Mom!" He was struggling. "Less hugging! _Less_!"

She finally put him down, and asked:

"So when'd it happen?"

"Yeaaaah..." Kiba rubbed the back of his neck. "that's the other thing."

"What other thing?" she asked. "That you brought Hinata and Shino with you and you left them outside in the heat?"

"...yeah," said Kiba, "that was it."

Shino looked at Hinata.

"How could she tell we were here?" he whispered. "Defence jutsu?"

"She could smell you," said the voice behind them, and at the sound of his voice both genin quickly turned around and took a step back, both surprised to see a large dog with an eyepatch behind them.

"...wh-...wh-...why do you have an eyepatch?" asked Hinata.

The dog thought on this.

"Hmm," he said. "Strange. Usually the first question people ask is 'how can you talk?'"

"I presume some form of secret Inuzuka-clan specific jutsu," said Shino.

"Yes," said the dog. "That is pretty much it, really. You should go in and put your bags down so you both don't smell so much of sweat."

Hinata wondered how many people were going to comment on her scent that day as the dog sniffed further.

"Oh, you've both put some soap on yourselves," he said. "Ah, humans. So many of you undervalue the need for a healthy dirt-layer. But I forget myself; I am Kidomaru, Tsume's dog-partner."

"N-nice to meet you," said Hinata, and she held out a hand.

Kidomaru stared at it.

"S-sorry!" she said nervously, pulling it back, and the three of them went inside.

They found Kiba putting his bag down on the corridor floor and leaving his shoes on a high shelf, careful to hold a wriggling Akamaru well away from them. Shino and Hinata followed suit, and with a sheepish look from Kiba, were led to Tsume in what seemed to be a kitchen.

She was definitely Kiba's mother; that much was obvious from the moment Hinata saw her. Tsume wore a jonin jacket and tracksuit pants, both of which were covered in mud in various places and obviously stitched back together over and over. She was quite stocky, with short, wild hair and thin-pupilled eyes. Kidomaru walked up to her, his claws clicking on the wooden floor, and sat beside Tsume, patiently listening.

"Your grandfather'd always pester some Hyuga every time he came back from a mission," she said to Kiba. "Sometimes he'd annoy an Uchiha instead, but they tended to set him on fire...Anyway, hi, Hinata and Shino!"

Shino bowed a little.

"Good evening, Lady Tsume."

She looked him over.

"You look a lot like your dad," she observed. "And every other Aburame."

"Possibly," said Shino. "We do all seem to be genetically disposed to wearing long coats and sunglasses."

"And you talk like him too!" she said.

Turning to Hinata, she added, grinning:

"Like Mononobe, right?"

Hinata looked confused.

"I...I'm s-sorry, Lady Tsume, I don't-"

"Oh!" said Tsume. "Wait, no, I'm sorry, never mind."

She gently put a hand on Hinata's arm and squeezed it a little.

"You kind of look like your mom, is all," she said. "'Cept for your eyes."

Hinata was surprised, but she managed to stammer out: "You kn-know my mother?"

Tsume suddenly looked a little uncomfortable, and rubbed at her jacket. She seemed to be avoiding Hinata's gaze, something that had never happened to Hinata before, and looked down at the floor when she spoke again.

"Uh, Kiba," she said, "how bout you take these guys to your room? Dinner'll probably be soon."

"Okay," said Kiba, sounding a little uncertain. "Come on, it's this way."

He took them down a hallway, surrounded by photos of dogs and the occasional sword up on the wall.

"My sister'll make dinner," he said. "Mom's _really_ terrible with food, and I seem to have inherited that as well, so we either don't have dinner, get takeout, or Hana cooks."

He stopped just outside a door that had the faintest smell of burnt toast, and began to slide it open. Then he swiftly stopped, apparently remembering something, and turned back to them, hand still on the door,

"Uh...gimme one second," he said.

He moved the door open and slipped inside, closing it behind him as soon as he was in. There were rustling sounds for a few moments, then he was back a few seconds later, looking slightly flustered.

"Cleaning?" asked Shino.

"..._sorta_."

When Hinata and Shino were let inside the room, they could easily understand why Kiba wanted a few seconds to clear it. The entire floor was a dense cluster of clothes, books, CDs and other assorted junk laying around, the carpet only intermittently visible. The area around Kiba's bed was the only thing not covered in everything, so he led them there, Hinata staring around at the room in wonder, Shino looking rather bewildered.

"How do you find where everything is?" he asked.

"That's the beauty of having no system of organisation," said Kiba. "Every day's an adventure, and the buried treasure is socks."

Shino stared downwards, and wondered if he could apply chaos theory to Kiba's floor. Hinata looked around and saw that Kiba's wall was covered with posters of various things, including a few of some very pretty mountain-scenery Hinata was sure she'd seen before.

"Th-this is amazing," said Hinata. "You have so much...stuff!"

Kiba patted Akamaru.

"They don't have stuff in Hyuga-land?" he asked.

"We're expected t-to keep everything really clean," said Hinata. "I had to hide most of my things somewhere around my bed in case they searched my room while I was away."

"They'd do that?" asked Kiba.

Hinata nodded, and sighed.

"N-now I've left the clan, almost certainly."

Shino gently held out a finger for Akamaru to sniff.

"You haven't left the clan," he pointed out. "You've only left the clan's lodgings."

Hinata watched him.

"I'm p-pretty sure my father will have me removed from the clan, Shino," she said.

"Is he the absolute ruler of the Hyuga?" asked Shino.

"He's clan head," said Kiba from above them.

"The _absolute_ ruler?" Shino stressed.

Hinata considered this.

"No," she said. "We _do_ have a council."

"And you can appeal to them?"

_I think my problem is I don't appeal to them_, thought Hinata.

"I suppose," she said. "But I'm not very...well-liked by the council. Or many people in my clan at all. I'm not sure if I'd be able to count on them."

"Concerning," said Shino. "But it's still not impossible for you to return. Is there any kind of leverage you have that you could use to manipulate them?"

"N-no," Hinata said. "There's a lot of plotting going on in the clan, b-but I've always tried to stay out of it."

"You may have to become involved if you want to get back into the clan," said Shino. "Manipulative people are, ironically, often easier to predict. If you can somehow become useful to their plans, and _remain_ useful, you might end up successfully in the clan again."

"You want her to be a pawn?" asked Kiba.

Shino shook his head.

"More like a king," he said. "A king can't move much more than a pawn, but it's the most important piece in the game."

Hinata wondered what life had become when she was now a part of some kind of human shogi game.

"I..." she said.

The boys stopped discussing it and listened to her.

"...c-can we not talk about this r-right now?"

"Very well," said Shino. "Sorry."

In the silence that followed, he looked down at a stray magazine and picked it up to look at the cover.

"_Real Ninja Stories?_" he said.

"Yeah," said Kiba.

"Oh!" Hinata sat upright. "You read that?"

"Everyone in our house does," said Kiba. "My mom thinks they're funny 'cos they get so much stuff wrong."

"I g-guess so," said Hinata, "but I still like them."

"You read 'em as well?" asked Kiba. "I didn't figure you for someone who'd like that kind of thing."

"What kind of book did you think I'd like?"

Kiba said nothing.

"Flowers and g-girly stuff?" she asked.

"No," said Kiba, defensive. "I just didn't think you'd like 'Okachisai kills giant snake, runs off with bronzed naked chick'."

"Sometimes he kills spiders," said Hinata.

"You had to learn how to flower-arrange, didn't you?" asked Shino, putting the magazine down. "At the Academy?"

"Yes," said Hinata, exasperated at the mere thought of it. "It was _really_ b-boring. Except when Ino argued with the sensei."

"That happen often?" asked Kiba.

"Almost every other class."

"Not surprised," the dog-nin said. "Ino can talk _forever_."

"She can be quiet," said Shino.

"Like when?"

"I've been put in groups with her at the Academy. She didn't talk at me that much then."

"Well, you must've lucked out on those days, because I know she never stops talking at Shikamaru and Choji," said Kiba, playing with Akamaru's ear.

Shino shifted in place a little, uncomfortable at something. Kiba didn't seem to notice, but Hinata did, and she smiled slightly.

"What did you guys have to do when we were doing flower-arranging?" she asked.

Kiba and Shino were silent, smiles already appearing on their faces.

"What?" she said.

"...additional weapon maintenance," said Shino.

There was a fraction of a second of silence before Hinata and Kiba burst out laughing at this, Shino clearly grinning beneath the collar of his jacket.

"Yeah," said Kiba, "there were a _lot_ of jokes about 'kunai polish'."

"Avoiding laughing in that class was probably one of the harder things I've had to do," admitted Shino.

Kiba looked to him, curious.

"How _did_ you do that?" he asked.

"Look at the ceiling," said Shino. "Sometimes I'd cheat and laugh behind a book, but it was hard..."

Hinata and Kiba smiled at him, and he rapidly added:

"Tough. It was tough. _Difficult_!"

They still laughed, and he pushed his glasses up.

_I'm on a team with five year-olds_, he thought.

And yet he laughed with them anyway.

Not long after, they were called to dinner by Kiba's sister Hana, a tall girl who apparently worked as a veterinarian for the various ninja animals used in missions and around the village. Hinata had never seen a family eat a meal like this; all loudly talking over the top of one another, and with multiple dogs running around the table, some barking quite loudly. (Hana had _three_ of them.) Hinata noticed that only Kidomaru seemed to talk, possibly because he was the eldest of the dogs, and thought back to what Kiba had told her about him being the Inuzuka clan heir. If the Inuzuka didn't have primogeniture, what system did they have?

After dinner it was still light, so Kiba took them out onto the field to spar a little. They fought with only taijutsu for a while, then Kiba asked to see Hinata's Gentle Fist in action. To her delight it did indeed work on normal people, and Shino and Kiba didn't seem to mind having their right arms go completely numb for some time.

"Try shaking them," she suggested, as both poked experimentally at their hands as they flopped around.

"Do you fight other Hyuga much?" asked Shino.

"N-not often," said Hinata. "When I actually had a trainer, I s-sometimes sparred with other children. I never won, though."

"Eh," said Kiba. "If you couldn't beat anyone then, it was your trainer's fault, not yours. I've seen you fight. They should'a worked out you were better at Whirling Leaf and let you use that."

"Th-that would have been better," said Hinata, "but I think the point was that the clan heiress knew the clan's taijutsu. It would be k-kind of embarrassing to the clan if I was leader but I couldn't do Gentle Fist."

She sat down on a patch of grass.

"B-but I could only do Gentle Fist after what my father said to me in his office," she said. "Maybe he was right. Even if what he did hurt me inside, it did help me move on to the next level."

"Next level?" asked Kiba. "That's ridiculous, Hinata. Hiashi was just making excuses. You got Gentle Fist then because your mind was in the right place for it at the right time, and nothing he did had anything to do with it."

"A-alright," said Hinata.

"Could it be because you were thinking about Naruto?" asked Shino.

Hinata blushed and stammered: "Wh-why?"

"You didn't get the Byakugan 'til you worked out you liked him," said Kiba.

"Loved him," she corrected.

_Love him,_ she mentally added.

"You said strong emotions were an important factor in chakra-power," said Shino to Kiba. "Given what happened in Hisui, I would not be surprised if the events of our mission caused a surge in chakra."

"S-so the key to getting stronger is being terrified?" asked Hinata.

"What, are you terrified of Naruto?" asked Kiba.

Hinata said nothing.

"I think the key is a strong emotion," said Shino, "but not just _any_ emotion. It wasn't you being scared that triggered your ability to use Gentle Fist, it was you being brave."

"...oh," said Hinata.

Shino felt a flickering in his body and realised the kikai had detected another Aburame behind him. Turning around, he saw it was his father, given the man that was walking up the path had a moustache and goatee. Reaching the three of them, his father began by addressing Kiba.

"Hello, Kiba," he said. "I am Shino's father."

"Hey," said Kiba. "This is Hinata Hyuga. It's good having Shino as a squadmate."

"Is it?" asked Shino. "Ah...thankyou, Kiba. I consider it fortunate that I was put in a group with you and Hinata. Because you are both also excellent squadmates."

He carefully moved a beetle that was sitting on the end of a stick of grass and stood up, but Shibi said:

"No, Shino, there is no hurry. I will speak to Tsume before we go. It was nice meeting you, Kiba and Hinata."

"Th-thankyou."

"Bye."

Shibi entered the house and walked through the corridor as Hana passed him.

"Hello, Shibi," she said.

"Hello, Hana," said Shibi. "How is your work with the pig-nin from the Land of Truffles progressing?"

"It's okay," said Hana. "It's a pity we've had so few new puppies this year. I mean, sure, the pig is really important to the daimyo, but it's hard telling people I can't treat their dog 'cos I'm operating on a snout."

"You could explain it as 'I'm working for the truffle daimyo'," suggested Shibi.

"Why?"

"Because 'truffle daimyo' is an amusing phrase," said Shibi.

"Right," said Hana. "Mom's out the back of the house, if you're looking for her."

"Alright," said Shibi, and Hana left him.

Once through the back door, Hana was easy enough to find. She was sniffing at the trees on the edge of the hill, a thoughtful expression on her face.

"What's the matter with them?" asked Shibi.

"Half-dead," said Tsume.

"Half dead?" asked Shibi.

"Yeahp," said Tsume. "Like bits of 'em died and other bits went on living just fine."

Shibi frowned, and put a finger to his temple as he listened carefully.

"The insects within them are unharmed," he said. "Though I daresay those termites should probably have an eye kept on them."

"Can you kill 'em for me?" asked Tsume, with an ear to the trunk of one of the trees.

"Why?"

"'Cos termites are pests."

"Termites are a shining jewel in the glorious crown of the insect world," he said. "They are the greatest of eusocial predators with anterior-rounded gasters that evolved from cockroaches. Or wasps."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning I will kill them if they get to your house," he said, "but not before."

"It'd be easier for you to do it now," said Tsume. "They'll get to the house, there's no question. All they ever do all day is eat wood."

She laughed.

"Heh. They eat wood."

Shibi sighed exasperatedly.

"Why do I get the feeling Kiba is going to grow up to be exactly like you?" he asked.

"Hope not," said Tsume. "One of me's enough, I think."

"He's taken to your dislike of Hiashi fast enough," said Shibi. "And he seems to have followed his daughter's lead."

"Kiba doesn't have a daughter."

"I meant Hiashi's daughter."

Tsume stepped away from the tree.

"What?" she said.

"I know," said Shibi, "I accidentally said a grammatically ambiguous sentence-"

"No, what you said about Hinata leading him," she said. "He said it was just him insulting Hiashi."

"No," said Shibi. "Details are uncertain, given the nebulous quality that all rumours inherently carry, but the general consensus of today's events was that Hinata told Hiashi she was disobeying him, and would not return to the compound with him. Then Kiba and Shino stepped in to support her."

"Hinata?" asked Tsume. "No way. That girl might look like Hikari, but she's basically the shyest kid you could ever imagine. _Your_ kid talked more than her."

"Her manner hides her true personality," said Shibi. "She is known for being friends with Anko Mitarashi, and from what I've discerned from people of her age group, she is infatuated with Naruto Uzumaki."

Tsume grinned.

"Minato's kid?" she said. "She likes Minato's kid?"

"Apparently he looks like his father and acts like his mother," he said.

Tsume thought.

"Don't all the girls her age like Sasuke Uchiha?" she asked. "S'what Kiba said."

"Yes, Shino implied something similar," said Shibi. "Apparently, Hinata is an exception."

"Cool," said Tsume. "Well, I dunno if a Kushina'd be interested in someone _that_ quiet-"

"Because Minato was the life of every party," said Shibi.

"-oh, whatever," said Tsume. "Anyway, I'm glad she's friends with Anko Mitarashi. I _like_ that girl. If Kiba was just a little older, I think I'd try and marry 'em off."

"I suspect Kiba may be receptive to that idea even at his current age," said Shibi. "He is nearly thirteen now. Suppose he inherits your serial flirting?"

"Nah," said Tsume. "Kiba's more like..."

She trailed off into silence, and Shibi nodded.

"Do you think he's still alive?" he asked.

"Hope not," she said.

There was a long silence before Tsume spoke again.

"How're you holding up?" she asked. "Been a few months since the funeral now."

"It's...difficult," Shibi admitted.

"To hide it?"

"No," he said. "But I think it may be for Shino."

"You talk to him?"

Shibi laughed humourlessly.

"Do you talk to Kiba about Ashinoura?"

"Tch," said Tsume. "I think we'd just commiserate and bitch about him, to be honest. He hates him, I think."

"Unsurprising."

"What, you don't?" asked Tsume. "You've hunted him. You were there that night. You saw what he did."

"I see little productivity in hatred," said Shibi. "Even somebody like Ashinoura had motivations, reasons. Loves, follies."

Tsume raised eyebrows at him.

"I'm not sure whether he had more love or more folly, to be honest," he said.

He stepped away from her.

"Don't hold it in forever," he said. "You'll be able to talk to Kiba and Hana about it, someday."

"When you talk to Shino," she said as he walked back down the hill.

He found him standing in front of Hinata and Kiba, moving around a cloud of kikai in a long, flowing stream. Sensing him arrive, Shino stopped and pulled the bugs back into himself, then quickly picked up his backpack and put it on.

"I'll see you tomorrow," he said to the others.

Silently, together, the father and son left Hinata and Kiba, and walked down the field.

Shino broke the silence.

"Am I in trouble?" he asked.

"I don't know," Shibi responded.

This was the kind of exasperatingly evasive answer that Shibi seemed to relish, so Shino accepted it without further comment.

"I was sent a Hyuga messenger," he said. "Very serious; devoted to his clan. As such, I do not entirely trust his testimony. He informed me you acted arrogantly when Hiashi spoke. He said you lectured Hiashi on village law."

"It was not unbidden," said Shino. "Hinata has informed me her father attempted to force her to improve her taijutsu via psychological manipulation. I consider his treatment of her to go beyond reasonable training."

"And you will defend her from him?"

Shino swallowed.

"Kiba and I will stand alongside Hinata," he said. "And while she is hurt, but not defenceless. We are merely aids in her...struggle."

"Struggle," said Shibi. "Are you prepared for consequences of this decision? No allegiance is without some form of opposition. The Hyuga clan is a considerable adversary, and your choice is one I cannot help you with."

In truth, Shino had no idea how the future would unfold for him. It'd been a long week for him, and he half suspected the reason behind all of his odd decisions lately was because he hadn't been getting quite enough sleep. But he did know one thing: whatever Kiba and Hinata did, it seemed to help him somehow. If the only way to getting stronger was a powerful emotion, as he theorized, then he had to stay with the two of them.

"I remain committed," he said.

Shibi accepted this, and they fell back into silence. Then, he asked in a voice as innocent as he could possibly manage:

"Are you disappointed you are not in the squad with the Ya-"

"I have established that we will not discuss that," said Shino. "_Ever_."

Shibi chuckled quietly to himself all the way back to the clan compound.

Hinata and Kiba stood and watched them leave as the glow of the sun died away. Once they had gone past the hill, she looked back to Kiba.

"You have a nice house," she said.

Kiba inclined his head, as if to suggest he neither disagreed nor agreed entirely. He seemed to like people to think he was a casual guy, with nothing in his life much fazing him at all. Hinata wished she could act as effortlessly as Kiba was able to. It seemed to come to everyone his family easily.

"Where are you gonna go?" he asked.

She didn't know.

"S-somewhere," she said.

"I…" said Kiba. "...didn't mean that, like, where are you going in life, I meant, like, _now_."

Hinata realised that it was a long, dark way back to Konoha. She thought, perhaps, out here, in a place surrounded by trees, she had maybe found her way to the end of a very long journey. Nervously, fingers together, she asked:

"…c-can I st-stay here for a while? T-tonight? In your house?"

Kiba put a hand on her shoulder, and said:

"No, Hinata. You should go find a park bench to sleep on before the rain sets in."

Hinata smiled.

00000

The meeting had felt like hours, but as Anko well knew, 'hours' was entirely relative to the person experiencing it. She was a fast-paced person, really, and spending even a few minutes stuck inside the hall with every other ninja in the village was a level of boredom she'd trade any preposterously dangerous mission for.

She stared boredly at the various shinobi on the opposite side of the Hokage, who was still talking about kunai manufacturing.

_Do him_, she thought. _Do him, do him, do him, he's gay, he's married, do him...done him already, needs more practice..._

Suddenly a shadow passed over her, and she looked up to see Kakashi sit down next to her.

"Where have you been?" she asked, as quiet as she could manage. "This's been going for ages already."

"I was...getting a pap smear," said Kakashi.

Anko thought this over.

"…can men get those?" she asked.

"Oh, yes, Anko," said Kakashi. "Otherwise, who knows what tumours might develop in my cervix?"

"Smartass," muttered Anko.

_Nice ass, though_, she mentally added.

"Did I miss anything important?" asked Kakashi.

"N-"

"Now," interrupted Sarutobi, slightly louder, "to the matter of the Chunin exams. Any jonin who is currently acting as sensei to a genin squad, stand up and state whether you will or will not enter your students."

Kakashi stood, as did Asuma, Guy and Kurenai.

"Where is Yoru Aotsuki?" asked Sarutobi.

"On a mission," said Guy. "She asked me to personally tell you that both her and I are entering our squads, Lord Hokage."

"_She_ and I," corrected Asuma.

Guy turned around and pointed at him, glaring.

"Do you want to step outside?" he asked.

"Well, glad it's not me this time," said Kakashi.

"Kakashi, you as well?" said Guy. "Alright. I will personally challenge both of you at once!"

"Enough, Guy," said Sarutobi. "This is no time to be challenging people to a how-many-dango-can-we-fit-in-our-mouths-at-one-time contest or something."

Guy looked contrite.

"Yes, Lord Hokage," he said.

_Although that dango contest is actually a pretty good idea_, he thought.

"I would also like to enter my squad," said Asuma.

"As would I," said Kakashi.

"And Kurenai?" asked the Hokage.

"I-" Kurenai began, but then the door was flung open and two Hyuga burst entered the room: Hiashi and an aide.

Everyone gasped as the Hyuga appeared, except for Kakashi, who said:

"Huh. I suppose I was here for the good part."

"You're not meant to be here," said Anko, standing.

"And?" said the aide.

"_And_," said Anko, "f-"

"Anko," said Sarutobi.

"...orget it," she finished, and reluctantly sat down.

"Why have you come here, Hiashi?" asked Sarutobi.

"It concerns my eldest daughter's participation in the Chunin Exams," said Hiashi.

"Your involvement in this discussion is barred due to that very reason," said Kurenai. "Personal concern about the safety of your daughter is irrelevant compared to her assessment of the ri-"

"I know the rules," snapped Hiashi. "Hinata must be removed from participation."

"Must?" asked Sarutobi. "This is not your clan, Hiashi."

Hiashi hesitantly fell silent.

"You and your clan's opinion of Hinata's abilities do not affect whether she participates in the Chunin Exams or not," said Sarutobi. "This is the same for your nephew, Neji."

"She has voluntarily left the Hyuga estate-"

"But not the clan?" asked Sarutobi.

Hiashi again said nothing.

"Kurenai," said the Hokage. "I believe she is living with the Inuzuka clan now."

"Yes, Lord Hokage," said Kurenai. "That is what she and Kiba have told me."

"Does Hinata still consider herself to be a Hyuga?" asked Sarutobi.

"Yes, Lord Hokage."

"She has not altered her family name to 'Inuzuka'?" asked the Hokage.

"No," Kurenai said, and then muttered: "I doubt that's the family name she'd change it to."

"What?"

"Nothing, Lord Hokage," she said.

Hiashi spoke again, the aide supportively glaring at Kurenai.

"If you will not honour the intent of her clan, will you go against the wishes of her parent?"

"There are two orphaned genin in my squad," Kakashi broke in. "In a temporary state where she lacks an official legal guardian, Hinata's participation is like theirs: entirely her own choice."

"And she has chosen to undertake the exams?" asked Hiashi.

"Yes," said Kurenai. "All three of my genin have."

Hiashi took a deep breath and stood even straighter than he normally did, drawing himself to his full height to give the impression he'd won.

"Very well," he said. "I will observe my daughter's progression with interest."

"Makes a change," said Anko as the aide and Hiashi left.

00000

Hinata stared in increasing horror and desperation as the tea-flavoured ice-cream melted in her spoon, the tub resting on the table in front of her. Anko had invited her to her house, and then promptly made good on her promise to educate her in certain things she'd never been told about at the Academy.

It was a mixed blessing, having Anko talk about it. She was knowledgeable, which was good, but Hinata didn't see the necessity of being _quite_ that graphic. Her older sister had given her the ice cream, presumably in an attempt to make things less awkward for her, but Hinata had only eaten most of it to be polite. Bringing the spoon up to her mouth again, she relievedly ate the last spoonful as Anko finally finished.

"...and that's pretty much how everything works," she said in conclusion.

Hinata put the spoon back in the bowl.

"D-did I r-really n-need to know _all_ of that, neesan?" she asked.

Anko shrugged.

"Hey," she said, "might be useful someday. Sure helped me."

Hinata's stomach did something that was probably not caused by ice-cream.

"N-neesan," she said, "I'm _twelve_."

"Okay," admitted Anko, "yeah, not that handy right now, but some of it might help later. Don't want you to get pregnant or whatever."

"Y-you said that was impossible."

"_Now_ it's impossible," Anko corrected. "You done?"

"Y-yes," said Hinata, handing Anko the container.

Anko peered into it with a keen eye.

"Nope," she said, "there's still some melted stuff left in here."

She held it out to Hinata, who shook her head and raised her hands as politely as she could manage. Unoffended, Anko began to drink the contents of the bucket until she finished it off, some spilling on her jacket.

"Ah...neesan-"

"Huh," said Anko. "Eh, I'll clean it off later."

Hinata wondered how Anko had survived this long by herself, considering the state of her apartment. She took the Kiba model of clothes organisation and applied it to virtually everything outside of weapons, which were all stashed quite neatly and obviously well cared-for. She knew Anko was in her twenties, but sometimes she thought she was more like her younger sister than her older one.

A more thoughtful look appeared on Anko's face.

"Hinata," she said, "there's something else I have to tell you."

Hinata pushed her fingers together.

"N-neesan, I'm pretty s-sure you've c-covered everything-"

"No, it's not about that," said Anko.

Hinata looked visibly relieved.

Anko moved from the chair across the table to the one next to Hinata, much closer. She crouched a little as she spoke.

"Hinata, right now..."

She scratched at an ear in thought.

"Now, you're twelve. You'll be thirteen soon, and you're a genin. Around about now, you'll have to make choices. Well, you've always had to make choices, but now they actually count."

Hinata nodded encouragingly, obvious as it was that Anko clearly didn't give speeches like this very often.

"What you've chosen to do lately - walking away from what your clan told you to do – it's good that you're doing that now. Because what happened in Hisui was rough, but definitely not the roughest thing that can happen to a ninja by a longshot. If you're going into the Chunin Exams, you should know that you've gotta be ready."

"For what?" Hinata asked.

Anko sighed.

"I can't tell you," she said. "I said I was out doing missions, and I am still, but I mostly can't keep you here because I'm proctoring part of the Chunin Exams this year. Your clan's made a case against you competing, and if they found out you lived with the proctor, they could force your whole squad drop out."

"Okay," said Hinata.

_This has gotten a lot bigger than I expected it to be._

"Are you okay living with Kiba's family?" asked Anko.

"Yes," said Hinata. "They're all really nice. Even before he knew what happened with...with f-father, Kiba said he thought I was strong. He s-said he'd be my older brother."

"Woah, what?" asked Anko. "Muscling in on my turf, huh?"

Hinata stared at her.

"N-neesan, what does that even mean?"

"I dunno, actually," said Anko. "My dad used to say that. Anyway, I'm glad you're with them. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying all the other clans in Konoha suck, but the Inuzuka're probably my favourite. When I came back to the village, the Inuzukas all supported me rejoining. Not a lot of other people did."

For a while, neither said anything after this. They didn't talk about Anko's time away from the village when she was younger, but Hinata knew about it. Anko, as well as other children, had been led astray from Konoha by a rogue ninja. Only she had successfully returned. Close to Hinata now, though, Anko seemed less reluctant than usual.

"Y'know," she continued, "they let me back in 'cos I was so young. Some of the village council members made big speeches about how I was only a kid, so I didn't know what I was doing. They said I got duped along with everyone else."

Her brown eyes seemed to darken.

"But I know better," she said. "I left Konoha because I wanted to, and I came back because I wanted to. I could've gone to Toride like all the other ninja refuse that slip through the fingers of the trackers, but I didn't. I knew I did wrong, even if I was only a kid."

The mention of Toride brought Hinata's mind back to Hisui, and the talk of Kiba's father and her mother. What exactly had Gishiki meant by talking about her mother and Kiba's father as if he knew both of them? Hinata's mother had died not long after the last Shinobi World War had finished; Gishiki would have had to have been quite young if he had met her. And why had he referenced Shino's mother as well? What kind of coincidence could connect three adults and their children in such a similar way?

"Neesan…how often do people come back to the village?"

"Not a lot," said Anko, bluntly. "A ninja usually only leaves their village if they've got some stupid-ass dream and they think the rules are just keeping them down. Or if they've done something. Though it'd have to be _really_ bad to make it worth a death mark. Do you mean like Kiba's dad?"

Hinata swiftly looked down, and realised people didn't really need the Byakugan to see through her.

"If you're asking 'will he come back', I doubt it," said Anko. "The guy was always...unfocused. Staring off into space and whatever. But anything that'd make him leave his family must've been _really_ important to him. He wasn't that great a ninja, but I always thought he honestly loved Tsume and Hana and Kiba. You know he didn't become a chunin 'til he was seventeen?"

"N-no," said Hinata. "Kiba doesn't talk about him."

"Nobody does, much," said Anko. "I don't know if that's a rogue ninja thing or just an Ashinoura thing.…I'm rambling. Sorry, Hinata. Don't tell Kiba I told you about this."

Hinata nodded again.

"And…" continued Anko. "About choices, and stuff...you really like Naruto, yeah?"

Hinata frowned at Anko sideways and gave her an "are you freaking kidding me" look.

"Has he ever gotten angry or violent for no reason?"

Hinata thought.

_Anko-neesan must know about him being the container for the Nine-Tailed Fox, but she doesn't know that I know. Only Naruto knows that I know._

_I wonder if people know that Naruto knows, and that he knows that they know as well?_

_...now I'm confused._

"N-not at _me_," she said. "A-and when he does at other people, he doesn't really hurt them."

She thought more.

"He's n-not very smart, really," she admitted.

"Okay," said Anko. "Just as long as he doesn't hurt you."

"I d-don't think he would," said Hinata.

_Even now, when he doesn't know how I feel, he wouldn't._

When Hinata's left, some twenty or so minutes later, Anko seemed almost nervous as she saw her to her front door, the sun setting behind Hinata.

"Hinata…" she said, leaning on the doorway.

Hinata turned around.

"Hmm?" she said.

"I probably won't get to see you before the exam starts. Next time you see me, I'll be your proctor."

Hinata nodded in acceptance.

"So…" Anko cleared her throat. "So, good luck, and I love you."

Hinata blinked and concentrated to make sure that she heard Anko right. It'd been a very abrupt declaration. Then again, Anko didn't say things like that often, so she probably wasn't used to it.

"Thankyou, neesan," said Hinata. "I love you too."

Both women smiled, as Anko shut the door and Hinata walked away.

00000

You might want to borrow some form of time machine if you want to read the next chapter any time soon. Might I suggest a DeLorean?

-Memorium Activity


	8. Two Days Before

Hello readers! I know it's been two months, but considering this is me we're talking about, I'm surprised I didn't take even longer. In other news, I now actually have a dog, so Akamaru will hopefully be more realistically written from here on out.

00000

_Chapter 8: Two Days Before_

Ayame stood in the heat of the ramen stand and tried to speak politely to the old man in front of her. The old man was wearing a huge coned hat that only just kept the sun off of his long, bulbous nose, and his entire body except for his head was covered in bandages or fabric of some kind. He was tall, but also very fat, which made him look shorter. He'd been a semi-regular at Ichiraku for some time, and her father always told her to keep customers coming back as much as possible, but he barely ever seemed to buy anything other than the cheapest shio, and he really didn't smell good.

"Good afternoon, sir," she said, her attempted smile coming off as a grimace. "Wh-"

"Ramen," said the old man, his voice rumbling with age. "Shio. Hot."

"Yes, sir," said Ayame through her teeth.

She got up to make it while the old man sat at the booth. Turned away from him, she scrunched up her nose to keep the onion smell away out of her breath as she put noodles into the broth. Adding soy sauce, she looked back to see if there were any more customers coming, but right now it was only the old man. Ayame could hardly believe it. Chunin exams usually got them a lot of business, what with highly overworked organisers burning the midnight oil and little genin out in a whole new Hidden Village.

"Lot of ninja coming out here," said Ayame.

The old man, who had been staring at the scenery, looked back at Ayame, peering out from under his coned hat.

"Hm?"

"Ninja," Ayame reiterated. "You know, this is a hidden village?"

The old man grunted, or perhaps cleared his throat, and took the bagged shio from Ayame slightly quicker than she'd expected from him. She was watching him dig through his pockets for change when she saw a familiar orange jumpsuit and shock of blond hair run past.

"Naruto!" she called.

Some way away, he stopped when he heard her and stood on the spot for a second, looking over at the store. Then he jogged over, stopping just outside the cover.

"Hey, Ayame," said Naruto. "I can't stick around, sorry."

"Exam training?" asked Ayame.

Naruto nodded regretfully. He would have _liked_ to get ramen, but Kakashi had taken him aside a few days ago and asked him if he ate anything besides noodles. He told Kakashi that he quite often drank milk, and since he'd figured out a way to eat the results of milk that had gone off (which he had named Miso Cheese), that counted as a solid other than ramen. Kakashi had responded by ordering him to eat vegetables other than the ones found in instant noodle packets, and although Naruto didn't think his sensei was dedicated enough to stake out his house to make sure he ate them, he wasn't willing to take the risk.

It was then Naruto noticed the old man was staring at him, an anxious frown on his face, halfway through getting up from his chair.

"What?" asked Naruto. "Have we met, gramps?"

The old man paused for a moment, then muttered something and left the stand, clutching at his bag of shio. He turned at the other side of the road and disappeared, walking past trees.

_That was weird_, thought Naruto, and he made sure to cross on the opposite side of the road to the old man.

As the old man made his way through the ever-falling leaves, he opened the bag and sniffed at it. Still walking, he closed the bag again and sighed, quietly enough that only he could hear it. Stepping past a sapling, his hand brushed up against it for a moment. He didn't notice, but the leaves on the tree shrivelled a little.

Naruto jumped over the wire fence at the end of the alleyway, and found himself walking up a hill. Pushing past bushes, he stepped over a tree root as tall as his knee and realised he was on a long, empty road, full of giant trees. At first he thought he was alone, but then his eyes wandered to a patch of beige and purple in between a pair of trees.

Looking closer, he saw that it was Hinata, sitting down by the trees and staring off into the distance. She was looking out across the road with her hands out at each tree's roots, obviously tired but smiling broadly as the leaves above her shaded her face from the sun. Her smile looked a lot more natural than what Naruto usually saw; when Hinata smiled, she tended to look down and turn away slightly, as if to shield it from the world. He felt bad for her sometimes; even Sasuke smiled openly once in a while. Here, she made no attempt to hide it, so it was much easier to see from far away.

From his own recent experience, Naruto guessed she was looking so pleased because of training. Sakura had explained to him a few days ago that the body produced chemicals called endorphins when it went through a lot of physical activity, and endorphins made you happy. Naruto didn't really see the effects of hours of work on his own mood, but he definitely knew by now he was much less likely to argue with Sasuke or Sakura if it was the end of the day than if it was the start or middle. Then again, that could be sheer exhaustion; Kakashi had been pushing all of them even harder than they'd trained in the Land of Waves.

_Actually getting to the exams'll be a relief_.

He held up a hand and waved to her, shouting:

"Hey, Hinata!"

She jumped a little as she heard him speak, obviously broken out of a daydream by the way she rubbed at her neck. She seemed to tone her smile down into a meeker one quite quickly after she saw him, although Naruto could have sworn she looked scared for a fraction of a second.

_Maybe it's the fox_, he thought to himself, and he wondered if she'd talk to him at all.

She did, standing up and walking over to the other side of the road, never quite looking directly at his eyes. She stopped a few metres away, putting her hands together and twiddling her fingers.

"H-hi, Naruto," she said.

If anyone else avoided eye contact as much as Hinata did, Naruto would have probably been suspicious of them, but even he knew Hinata was different. He'd improved (slightly) at social graces since he'd started school, and he knew there was a definite knack to knowing when to look directly at a person and when to look away. He'd taken a while to work it out, and he guessed Hinata might have problems with that as well; it would make sense, given how shy she always was.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

He immediately regretted saying it. The question made Hinata look up at him for a brief moment, but then she was staring at the ground again, her skin even paler than usual, and she murmured something that Naruto guessed meant she was fine. He kind of wished that she'd speak louder; partly because it made conversation with her difficult, but also because he kind of liked hearing her voice.

"Y-yes, I'm fine," she said. "I'm just tired, b-because of all the…tr-training."

She looked uncomfortable and reached up to the back of her neck with her hand.

"Hey!" said Naruto. "Are you gonna scratch your neck?"

Hinata immediately pulled her hand back down to waist height, looking like she'd just been caught sneaking food from a pantry late at night.

"U-um…" she whispered, staring quite intently at somewhere around his chest.

Naruto cursed in his head, and wondered whether he'd spilled ramen on his shirt or something.

_What kinda question was that? Now she thinks I'm all weird and stuff!_

"Uh…" he said, raising his hand, "it's just, I scratch my head when I'm uncomfortable too-hey!"

He looked at his right arm as it stretched out to the back of his neck.

"See? I didn't even mean to do that."

She looked to it and laughed for a second.

"I w-wasn't uncomfortable, Naruto," she said. "I mean, I'm not. N-not around you, anyway."

"Oh," said Naruto, and he knew then for certain that she wasn't scared of him because of the Nine-Tailed Fox.

Then, curious about it, he added:

"Why not?"

Hinata crossed her arms and looked thoughtful, biting her lip slightly. Naruto looked away from her to give her time to think, and saw two people walking up the path.

_Who're they?_ he thought.

"Well," she said, "I g-guess you're…"

She trailed off as she followed his gaze to the figures, and looked worried when she saw them.

"You noticed as well," said Naruto.

"Y-yes," Hinata said.

He looked at her with a deadly serious expression on his face, doing his best to mask his fear to stop her from panicking.

"Other villages' genin," he said.

She stared at him blankly, looking confused. With little time to explain, Naruto took Hinata by the arm and pulled her along with him to the side of the road with bushes, hiding behind a thick shrub with flowers that were fluffy and white. Crouching beside her, Naruto explained as the genin walked up the path.

"My squad ran into a girl and two guys yesterday," he whispered. "They're here for the exams and they're all really tough. One of 'em has this huge gourd on his back and red hair and no eyebrows. He's gonna be tough to fight."

"Y-you're going to fight him?" Hinata asked, expression fairly neutral.

Naruto frowned as he thought about this, then admitted, in an even quieter voice:

"…I kinda _hope_ not."

The look on her face changed to one of acceptance. Naruto was kind of relieved; he wouldn't have been able to admit being that scared of eyebrowless red-hair boy if it was Sasuke or even Sakura he was talking to. He'd never known Hinata to judge him harshly as everyone else, so he'd expected that kind of response from her all along, but it was still nice.

He looked down from the path to see he was still grabbing her arm.

"Sorry," he said, smiling apologetically, and took his hand off.

By now, the genin were close enough for Naruto to hear them. They were both girls; he guessed they were older than him and Hinata by a few years. Both wore headbands, so they were clearly ninja, but they were wearing long white robes that didn't look much like regular kunoichi outfits to Naruto. Crouching, he listened to their conversation for clues.

"…father says it's something the council will have to deal with," said one of them.

"But they'll _have_ to banish her from the clan," said the other; she seemed to be the younger one. "She defied Lord Hiashi."

"Yes," said the elder, "they say that her situation got that bad for her. I don't understand it, personally. She should never have let it get so difficult for her in the clan."

"How?" asked the younger. "The fight was with Lord Hiashi, wasn't it? There's not really any higher authority."

"Hoshi," said the elder, her tone of condescension stronger now, "pretty soon, you'll be old enough to understand how the clan _really_ works. There are methods for dealing with any obstacle, provided you have the skill. And if any Hyuga should have the skill, it should be the clan heiress. Hinata should have had everyone wrapped around her finger for years."

Hoshi let out a small laugh, noble and perfectly shaped, like a butterfly that had been caught and preserved in formaldehyde.

"Have you _seen_ Hinata's fingers?" Hoshi asked. "Short and pudgy."

"'Short and pudgy' sums up most of Hinata, really," said the first girl, and both of them laughed again.

Naruto wrenched his view away from the girls on the path and back to Hinata. She had one of her hands to her face, which seemed to have gone red with crying, and she looked away when he turned back to her.

He looked up again, and heard her begin to say something in a shaky voice, but the sound was snatched away from his ears when he jumped up over the bush and the path, landing in front of the two girls. Pointing at them, he let forth a shout:

"Hey!"

They both stopped mid-stride, confused at his sudden appearance.

"Who're you?" asked Hoshi.

Naruto brushed pollen from his jacket and folded his arms.

"I'm your future Hokage, lady, so maybe you should get on my good side for a start!"

"Hm," said the first girl dismissively. "Never mind, Hoshi. Just a commoner."

She started to walk forward again. Putting hands together, Naruto gathered chakra and released it, and the once-empty road behind him was suddenly packed with shadow clones, glaring at the Hyuga.

Reluctantly, the girl stopped walking.

"Hmm," she said, expression basically unchanged. "You can summon clones."

Hoshi raised a finger.

"Ah..." she said, "Hiroko, I think those are shadow clones."

"Damn right, they're shadow clones!" said Naruto. "How common do you think _that_ is, Hiroko?"

Hiroko turned to Hoshi.

"Lower-borns have no sense of etiquette, Hoshi," she said.

Looking back to Naruto, she said, slowly and loudly:

"We are not interested in fighting you."

"Maybe you should'a thought about that before talking about Hinata behind her back," said Naruto. "That's not being much like a family. I mean, you two _are_ from her clan."

Hiroko huffed.

"If it's money you want-"

"You're not listening to me," Naruto said. "I want you to say sorry to Hinata."

Hiroko drew herself to her full height.

"Well," she said, "unless you've brought her with you-"

"I'm here."

The two girls looked behind them and found Hinata, and Hoshi jumped a little at the sight of her. Naruto was impressed; Hinata had snuck up behind them without him noticing at all. She was still crying as she stared hard into their eyes, but as she raised her right arm to her face, she wiped the tears away in a stroke. All that remained from before was a face tinged with red.

"Oh, _Hinata_," said Hiroko, her tone of mock-concern excruciating. "You look like a temple guardian."

"If you won't do what N-naruto says," said Hinata, "then I'm g-going to ask: take back what you said."

"Clan-leavers and commoners are the same to us, Hinata," said Hiroko. "A branch-house member is worthy of more respect than you."

"I see," said Hinata in a low tone, as if this was exactly what she'd expected. "H-have you been listening to your father, Hiroko?"

Hiroko took this insult worse than Naruto expected she would, scowling deeply. It was the first time he'd seen her express anything other than disdain.

"You take back what you said about my father," she said darkly.

"Or w-what?" asked Hinata. "He'll g-get the Council to expel me from the clan?"

The fifty shadow clone Narutos retained their focused glare, but the real one faltered for a moment.

"You left your clan?" he asked Hinata.

She began to open her mouth, but then hesitated, and Naruto knew she didn't know how to respond to that question.

"Yes, she did," answered Hiroko, sounding much bitterer than she probably intended. "She left the pure lotus that rises towards the sun for the dirt of common life."

Although Naruto knew Hiroko really believed what she'd just said, he still had no idea what the hell it meant, and judging by Hoshi's reaction, she didn't know either. Hinata looked like she understood, but if Hiroko had said it to demoralise her, it had produced completely the wrong effect. Hinata burst out laughing, giggling freely in a way that sounded far more natural than how Hiroko or Hoshi had done it just before.

"That's n-not what a lotus means, Hiroko," Hinata said.

"It doesn't matter," Hiroko snapped. "Leaving the clan was not when you failed. You lost any right to be the heiress when you failed to learn Gentle Fist."

At this, Hinata's laughter stopped, and Hiroko went on.

"You know," she said, sounding as casual as she could, "I saw Hanabi fight one of her trainers yesterday. She has already mastered Eight Trigrams Thirty-Two Palms. And Neji, despite the setback of his birth, is said to be a genius at Gentle Fist. But you can't manage anything but a taijutsu for kindergarteners."

Hinata looked down, and Naruto clenched his fists at his side.

"That's it," he said, louder than before. "I have no idea what Gentle Fist is or why you're all talking about lotuses and dirt and the sun and everything. But I know if people like you are normal in the Hyuga clan, I'm glad Hinata's different, and maybe you should all think about being more like h-"

The breath was knocked out of his body as Hiroko's palm slammed into his chest. In that instant everything went numb, and he barely felt it when he fell onto the ground at Hiroko's feet. Hoshi watched in surprise and Hinata in horror as Naruto lifted his head up from the ground to see Hiroko staring down at him.

"_That_ is Gentle Fist," she said, "and maybe now you'll learn to shut up when Hyuga are talking."

Naruto tried to spit at Hiroko's feet, but his body wasn't working well enough to manage much other than blinking. The clones behind him stayed still. Unfortunately, creating fifty meant that his chakra was spread out over too many of them, so they were basically only good as a threat. He felt around his teeth with his tongue and found there was dust in his mouth, and maybe blood.

He hadn't seen that attack coming. It was a problem of his. People said he was clueless; now, lying in the dust, he agreed with them. He had to pay more attention when he was fighting, no matter how much he wanted to just shout at the world.

Then, above him, Naruto saw a glowing light, as bright and blue as a shaft of moonlight on a cloudless night. It was coming from Hinata – Hinata's eyes, he could now tell – and he watched in amazement as she brought together her hands for a jutsu.

"_Byakugan._"

The blue light flashed even brighter for a second, then dimmed, and Naruto could see from very far away that Hinata's eyes had changed. Spreading out her hands to either side of her body, Hoshi and Hiroko flinched as they saw thin points of the same blue light come out of her palms. She said nothing and glared at them both.

"We...should go," said Hoshi.

Hiroko frowned, then reluctantly nodded and stepped past Naruto, taking the unusual care to kick a tiny cloud of dust up near his face as her sandal passed near him. On his mental command, his clones parted to let them leave, forming a kind of corridor for the departing Hyuga girls. As they left, Hinata ran to Naruto and turned off her Byakugan, kneeling to the side of him.

She put a finger to his forehead, and lightly wiped away some of the dust.

"H-hey," said Naruto, coughing a little bit as he smiled.

"Are you okay?" she asked, looking worried.

"Yeah," said Naruto.

Then, thinking about it, he added:

"I kinda can't really move, though."

"Th-that's alright," said Hinata, putting her hands in her lap. "She got you in the chest, but you'll probably be able to move around soon."

"Okay," said Naruto, hoping she was right. "So when'd you learn how to do that? Gentle Fish, I mean?"

Hinata snickered, then stifled it with her hand.

"What?"

"Gentle _Fist_."

"I said Gentle Fist."

"Y-you said Gentle Fish," she insisted.

"Aw, c'mon, Hinata, I just fell on the ground and I can't move any of my arms or legs!"

"S-so you can't remember how to speak now?"

"Hinataaaa…"

Rubbing at her face, she stopped tittering and explained.

"A-about a week ago," she said. "When I was on my mission."

"Oh yeah," said Naruto. "Yeah, I learned a lotta stuff on my mission too! Like, I found out there's a jutsu so you can walk up trees, and I saw Sasuke putting tomato sauce in ramen!"

Hinata looked confused.

"R-really?" she asked.

"Yeah," said Naruto, "I know! Tomato sauce doesn't go with ramen! How can a guy like Sasuke be so smart but do weird stuff like that? Although miso actually goes with old milk really well-"

"N-no, I meant the jutsu so you can walk up trees," she said.

"Oh!" said Naruto. "Yeah, the Tree Climbing Jutsu! You should get your sensei to teach you."

"O-okay," said Hinata.

Naruto stared up at her, kneeling before him.

"So…" he said. "You're… not really getting along with your clan right now."

"…n-no," she admitted.

"Is it 'cos of people like them?" asked Naruto. "Talking about how great they are all the time?"

Hinata sighed a little and turned away, avoiding his gaze.

"Hey, c'mon, Hinata," said Naruto. "I told you about…"

His mind went back to the moment at Ichiraku's when he told her about the fox, and the calm look on her face when she told him she didn't care.

"About my problem," he finished.

She looked back at him and put her hands beside herself for support.

"I know out in the real world I'm rich and I have good grades," she said, "b-but in my clan, I'm like you. An outcast."

Naruto wondered at this as a cloud passed overhead.

_Hinata's like __**me**__?_

"S-some Hyuga…most Hyuga think that we're better than everyone else," she explained. "That's what Hiroko meant when she talked about a lotus. Anyone who isn't enough like w-what a proper Hyuga should be is…punished."

Poking at a stick on the ground, she continued:

"I couldn't learn Gentle Fist for my whole life, s-so I thought my father gave up on trying to teach me it. It m-must have been embarrassing for him. His eldest daughter, the heiress, c-couldn't learn the clan taijutsu. Then he let me overhear him talk a-about how weak I was. He said it was to make me stronger. And on my mission, I learned I could do Gentle Fist."

She finished talking, and Naruto clenched his teeth. If his arms and legs were still working, he would have gotten up and found Hinata's father, then punched him in the face. (Actually, he would have gotten up and at least tried to kick Hinata's father in the face even if only one of his legs worked; he was that sort of person.)

"You can't get stronger that way," he said, trying to keep his voice level. "Nobody ever gets stronger being sad."

Hinata moved her hands up to her chest and pushed her fingers together, eyes fixed on his.

"You learned Gentle Fist 'cause you were ready for it," he said. "And I think you're gonna better at it than everyone else."

Slowly, seemingly without noticing, she leaned in closer to him.

"W-why?"

"'Cos you got guts," he said, "and you work really hard, but you're scared a lot."

She nodded.

"But that's okay," he said, "'cause you're only scared when you forget how awesome you are! Believe it!"

Hinata resisted it for just a second, but then broke into an smile so wide that Naruto knew he'd gotten through to her somehow. Grinning too, he tried moving his feet, and fortunately they seemed to be working better.

"Hey, look!" he said. "I can move my feet now!"

"Wow," Hinata said, sounding genuinely surprised as she looked at his toes wiggling. "I-it usually takes a lot longer for a strike like that to wear off."

"Cool!" said Naruto. "So, if I ever fight a Hyuga, I'll be able to get up faster!"

"Mm-hmm," Hinata said.

Excited, he tried pushing himself up, but after a few tries, he found he couldn't get anywhere with just his legs working. Looking up to Hinata, he pouted a little bit.

"I guess I don't get over it that fast," he said. "Can you help me up?"

"Uh…" she said. "Y-yes, o-okay."

Her face red again, Hinata moved closer to Naruto's side and put a hand to the back of his left shoulder, which he lifted for her. Careful not to lean on her arm, Naruto felt Hinata's hand grasp his shoulder and moved his feet up towards him.

"Wait," said Naruto. "You should move your head up, or my knees'll hit you."

"O…kay," said Hinata.

She carefully moved upward until she was crouching next to him, and moved her hand around the back of his neck to his right shoulder. Her hand was warm from chakra.

"Are you ready?" he asked her.

She said nothing, but instead nodded.

"Okay," said Naruto, "now!"

She pulled him up to a sitting position, and he pushed his legs up with his feet, taking her with him as she moved from crouching. As they stood, his hand brushed up against the underside of her arm for a second, and Naruto suddenly felt like something in his chest was floating. It only lasted a moment, but it was long enough: when they were both standing, Hinata was frozen in a shocked expression, looking down at the ground.

"Uh…" said Naruto, watching his arms flop uselessly around him, "I guess I'll see you 'round, Hinata."

Looking down so sharply Naruto could barely see her face under all her bangs, Hinata quietly said:

"'s."

Naruto didn't know what that meant, but wasn't quite game to ask her right now.

"Okay," he said.

He looked back at her for a few more seconds, but she didn't move from that spot. Half-heartedly shrugging to himself, he turned around and left her there, hoping she wasn't really weirded out.

She wouldn't be, though. It was an accident. He hoped. It'd be fine.

Worriedly, he thought:

_At least I can go home and eat a couple bowls of…_

_Oh, wait._

00000

Kiba went a dozen steps before noticing Hinata was lagging behind him. Earlier, when they had been walking home from training, Kiba noticed Hinata was no longer next to him and Akamaru when the little dog turned around on top of his head and barked. Grabbing him and looking back himself, he watched Hinata trudge along the ground a few metres away, and went back for her.

It'd been a very long training session that day, so Kiba wasn't all that surprised when Hinata stopped and sat between the trees. For a girl whose most powerful offensive jutsu was close-range, she clearly wasn't that used to a lot of physical exercise. Shino was even worse: almost every time Kiba had fought him when they were only allowed to use taijutsu, he'd sent the bug-nin to the ground within the first minute. Both of them were improving, though, and neither had complained in any training session since they'd gotten back from Hisui Village.

Stepping up to Hinata as she sat in between two trees on the side of the road, Kiba rubbed at his chin and stared at her.

"What're you doing?" he asked.

"I'm tired," she said, looking up at him.

"Well…there's like, a bench not that far from here," he pointed out.

Hinata shook her head.

"T'far," she said.

"What?"

"Too far," she said, slightly louder.

Kiba shook his head, which dislodged Akamaru a little bit. Holding a hand up to his head to steady the dog, he said:

"What, you want me to carry you home?"

"N-no," said Hinata, "you go on."

Sensing something amiss, Kiba crouched in front of her so he was at her eye level.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Yes," said Hinata. "I-I'm just tired."

Kiba nodded. Looking at the ground, he suggested:

"Maybe we've been pushing ourselves too hard lately."

"The exams are a c-couple of days away," said Hinata.

"Yeah, but we shouldn't use up all our energy now," Kiba responded. "Save that for the actual thing, yeah?"

Hinata looked wistful.

"I know," she said. "I should pace m-myself more. I-it's just so much has been happening lately, and I...thought I could do _more_."

"Hinata," said Kiba, "you've been doing really good at training lately. Honestly, before? When we were doing taijutsu drills, I could usually kind of tell what your moves were gonna be like. Now, you move different when you fight."

"I've b-been trying to do more Gentle Fist stances," Hinata admitted. "The forms that I remember, anyway."

"Well, cool," Kiba said. "You're already really good at Whirling Leaf. Adding Gentle Fist stuff to it means you'll have your own secret awesome taijutsu that nobody else knows."

Hinata laughed.

"I'm serious!" said Kiba. "If you're gonna do this thing, you have to do it your way. You gotta quit thinking about doing more, and start thinking about doing _enough_."

Hinata raised her eyebrows at him.

"K-kiba, you got that from _Ruthless Kunai of Okachisai Part II_," she said.

"...yeah," Kiba admitted, "...but just 'cos I got it from somewhere else doesn't mean it's not true."

Now aware of a curious scent, he sniffed the air to identify it and grinned at Hinata.

"Good news," he said.

"They're m-making taiyaki at a bakery somewhere?" she suggested.

"Better, actually," said Kiba.

Smiling to himself, he stood up and started walking away.

"W-...a-aren't you staying for it?" asked Hinata.

Kiba looked back over the shoulder that Akamaru wasn't on.

"Nah," he said, "I think you'll like it better if I'm not here."

With that, Kiba left her there, walking away in the shade. Putting up an arm to steady Akamaru, Kiba pushed his hoodie back and tried to get the heat off his head by running his fingers through his hair. It was getting late in the year, but it was humid today, and he was still sweating from just walking around.

Leaving the road, he came across an empty field circled by trees; on the other side was the path to his house. The field was big and mostly empty, with only a few people to the left of the path that led towards Inuzuka land. As he walked through the field, he could see that they were ninja themselves, probably not much older than him, and they were from Konoha. Two of them, a boy and a girl, seemed to be playing with some kind of football.

On the edge of the field, the girl stepped back and kicked the ball into the air, towards the boy. It seemed to be going very fast, and basically had no arc at all; as things were, it was probably going to hit the boy at chest height. Then, just as the ball was reaching the boy, there was a flash of green light all around him, and the ball hit Kiba in the face.

"Argh!"

Kiba clutched at his face and fell down onto the grass, thankful that it was soft. Feeling his nose, he checked to see if it was broken, but it seemed fine. Moving his tongue around his mouth also suggested his teeth weren't broken or missing either, and he breathed a little freer after this.

_So it just hurts a lot_, he thought, and he couldn't help but moan a tiny bit.

There were sounds of running along with shouts of apology, and Kiba pulled his hands away from his face just in time to see the boy and girl crouching in front of him.

The first thing that struck him was that the girl was pretty even though (or perhaps because) she was covered in dust and sweat. Her hair was an aqua blue, darker in some places than in others; Kiba guessed from her scent this was probably because she didn't wash her hair much. She was wearing a black t-shirt and a red jacket with some kind of swirl design around her waist. The boy was taller, fairly thin, and had short spiky purple hair. His clothes were unusual; an undone maroon shirt and a black t-shirt below it, with a strangely high collar and long blue shorts. Kiba supposed the boy was kind of handsome too; he was probably the Sasuke-equivalent of his class. Kiba smelt a lot of scents shared between the two of them, so they were most likely squadmates.

"Are you okay?" asked the girl.

Kiba stopped rubbing the side of his nose.

"Yeah," he said, hoping he didn't sound like he was actually hurt.

"Sorry," said the boy. "I guess I missed the ball."

"Missed it?" asked Kiba. "It went through you."

The boy looked anxious.

"Uh, yeah," he said. "That's my jutsu. One of my jutsu."

"Nah," said the girl, stretching, "that pretty much _is_ his jutsu."

The boy looked sort of hurt for a second, then brushed it aside and said:

"Yeah, well, at least I can aim."

The girl glared at him and looked away from Kiba, poking at the boy's shoulder.

"What're you talking about?"

"You would've kicked the ball into my face, Hikui," said the boy, standing to his full height now.

Hikui stood up as well as she gestured at Kiba.

"So you let me kick it into this guy's face?"

"I didn't know he was there," said the boy. "Do we kick balls with our faces, Hikui?"

Smirking, Hikui opened her mouth to answer, but the boy interjected:

"Not what I meant!"

She laughed and let go of him, still grinning.

"Oh, are you having trouble with _that_ again, Kohaku?" she said.

"Uh, okay," said Kohaku, "let's look over what your track record is, Hikui: _nothing_."

"Pfft," said Hikui. "At least I got a track to..."

She trailed off and concentrated for a moment, then finished:

"…record myself on!"

Kiba rubbed his cheek at the spot where the ball hit him.

"Are you two done with the flirting?" he asked.

This made them both stop bickering, if only to look disbelievingly at Kiba.

"What?" asked Kiba.

Hikui and Kohaku shared a look as both offered a hand to him.

"You don't know us at all, do ya, kid?" asked Hikui.

"Kid?" said Kiba, offended. "What are you, thirteen?"

"Fourteen," she answered.

"Dammit," said Kiba, and he took her hand.

Once they pulled him up, Kiba could see that not only were they older than him, they'd probably been through a lot more missions - their metal headband plates weren't nearly as shiny as his. Kohaku's, which he had poked through and tied to one of his shirt button holes was caked in a dark matter that Kiba thought may have been blood, and Hikui's, which she'd tied around her neck like a neckerchief, had a lot of scratches on it.

"I guess you're from the grade below us," said Kohaku.

"Yeah-" said Kiba.

"Dog!" shouted Hikui.

Guessing pretty quickly which dog she meant, Kiba looked around for Akamaru, and found him sitting and wagging his tail behind them. Kiba picked him up before he could get into any trouble, and held him close to him.

"This is Akamaru," he said, holding him in his arms, "and he's a trained ninja dog, so don't-"

Hikui reached forward and starting scratching Akamaru behind the ears. Akamaru barked, but he seemed to enjoy the sensation, and he sounded like he was laughing as Hikui poked at him.

"_Tiny dog_..." she said in a teasing voice, "_tiny dog_..."

Akamaru barked happily as he rolled over in Kiba's arms and Hikui rubbed at his belly. Kiba, paying more attention to her than to Akamaru, almost dropped him when she noticed he was staring at her, but she didn't really seem to care all that much, holding his gaze for a few seconds before stepping away from the dog.

"So you're genin from Neji's class?" Kiba asked, putting Akamaru pack on his shoulders.

"Neji Hyuga?" asked Hikui. "Don't lump us in with that guy."

"Yeah," said Kohaku. "Has to be rough for Tenten. Stuck with Neji and Rock Lee."

"Weird squad for sure," Hikui agreed. "Anyway, I'm Hikui Shinkan. The guy who let a soccer ball hit you in the face is Kohaku Hosoi."

"Cool," said Kiba. "I'm Kiba Inuzuka. So, if you're in a squad, where's your other guy?"

"Present."

Within Kiba's line of sight and yet somehow stepping out of nowhere was the third member of the squad, and it was actually a girl. She was much cleaner than Hikui or even Kohaku, and her headband's metal plate was probably shinier than Kiba's. Her hair was long and lime green; part of it was held up in a tight bun, but the rest was in two long strands that went down to the small of her back. She wore a long-sleeved shirt and a wide, dark green skirt, and carried a small, worn book in her hand. She had small oval glasses on, and stared at Kiba with a blank expression that didn't express disdain or even boredom at seeing him, but instead mere acceptance.

"Oh, hey, Reido," said Hikui, in a pointed tone. "Great work making sure he was fine after he got hit in the face with a ball."

"You seemed to have it within control," Reido said calmly.

Hikui grunted at this and stuck her hands in her jacket pockets.

"_You're our medic_," she reminded Reido, who barely acknowledged this.

"Uh, wait..." said Kohaku, raising a finger. "_You_ thought _we_ could handle something without you helping?"

Reido looked blankly at him.

"It was a trivial situation," she said.

"Of course," said Kohaku.

Hikui nudged Kiba.

"This's Reido Zettai," she said, "our medic."

Kiba nodded, and held out a hand to Reido.

"Hey," he said. "I'm Kiba-"

"Irrelevant," said Reido.

There was silence.

"...what?" asked Kiba.

"She called you irreverent," Hikui said to him.

"'Irrelevant'," corrected Kohaku.

Hikui threw her hands up.

"Whatever," she said. "Point is, Reido don't give much of a-"

Kohaku nudged her and motioned with his head towards Kiba.

"…damn," Hikui finished.

'_Damn'?_ thought Kiba. _They think they can't swear in front of me? I'm not eight! They're only a year older than me, anyway._

Mentally roiling but outwardly calm, Kiba spoke to Reido.

"I get it," he said. "You're a genius who's so good at everything you think you don't need the rest of your squad."

"Kohaku and Hikui are unnecessary," Reido answered, without any time to consider the statement.

"You think they're slowing you down," Kiba commented.

"No," said Reido. "I am unconcerned with their performance. Their rank advancement is their business."

Kiba looked at Kohaku and Hikui with a raised eyebrow; both shrugged. He looked back to Reido.

"Are you 'concerned with my performance'?" he asked.

Reido did think this over, even if it only took a few seconds.

"No," she said.

"That's a pity," said Kiba.

He looked down at the book in her hand.

"So," he said, "you like books?"

"They are necessary to learning," said Reido.

"Yeah," said Kiba, "but, do you _like_ them?"

Reido thought.

"I do not recreationally read," she said.

"Do you recreationally do anything?" asked Kiba.

"No," she responded again.

Kiba smiled.

"You want help with that?" he asked.

The silence that lasted for a full half minute was one of the most awkward Kiba had ever experienced, but he kept his cocky expression on full-blast anyway. This was _fun_.

Eventually, evidently unable to take the situation, Kohaku broke the silence.

"He's flirting with you, Reido," he said, putting a hand to his head.

"I am aware of this," said Reido, but she said no more.

Kiba shrugged.

"Whatever, then," he said. "So, are you guys doing the Chunin Exams?"

At this question, Hikui and Kohaku suddenly looked very nervous, and both seemed to scan the area around them. Reido's expression didn't change.

"Yes," she said.

"Shouldn't you be doing somethin' other than play ball?" asked Kiba.

A clash of sound and a puff of smoke appeared in the midst of the four children, and out of it stepped a tall woman with long silvery hair and blue eyes.

"_Exactly_," said the woman.

Hikui and Kohaku seemed to groan slightly as she turned to them, looking at both of them sternly.

"What are the three of you doing out here?" she asked.

Kohaku was silent for a moment, eyes flitting here and there as he seemed to whisper to himself.

"De...veloping foot-eye co-ordination skills," he said.

Ignoring this, the woman turned to Reido.

"Reido?"

"They consider our workload excessive, sensei," she said. "They travelled here to avoid it."

"Thankyou, Reido," said the woman, and she went back to Hikui and Kohaku. "If you two want to become chunin, you have to be prepared for all possibilities, and that means you have to train for all eventualities. Reido understands this."

"Reido knows everything," said Hikui, in a voice that suggested a vast, suppressed hatred.

"Hikui, forty pushups," said the woman.

Kiba was surprised to hear this from the woman, but even so, Hikui carefully and reluctantly dropped down to the ground on all fours and began to do the pushups. After a moment, Kohaku followed suit.

"Kohaku," the woman said, "I didn't tell you to do pushups."

"Solidarity, sensei," said Kohaku from below her.

The woman regarded the two for a few seconds.

"…if both of you insist on being difficult," she said.

Akamaru growled a little. Kiba began to step away, thinking now would be a good time to leave, but the woman noticed that as well.

"Mister Inuzuka, where are you going?" she asked.

"Home?" said Kiba.

"Home, _Yoru-sensei_," the woman corrected.

_Oh, I'm sorry I didn't call you by your name and title, Yoru-sensei_, thought Kiba. _I should'a just known it naturally without anyone having to tell me._

He patted Akamaru to calm him down.

"Is there something you wanted me for?" he asked. "Yoru-sensei?"

"Yes," said Yoru. "I'm going to ask you to stay away from my squad."

_Well, they hit __**me**__ in the face!_ Kiba thought.

"You think I'm gonna sabotage their chances in the exams?" he asked.

Yoru's otherwise professionally stern expression was tainted with the hint of a smirk.

"My genin cannot waste time playing with children," she said.

Kiba thought long and hard about whether he'd heard her right, then went on to a brief period of seriously considering punching her in the face.

"Would you mind repeating that, Yoru-sensei?" he said, in as level a tone he could manage.

"You are a child," said Yoru, "involved in something considerably beyond you by people with an overinflated sense of your own skills as a shinobi."

Kiba slouched, and happy as he was to see the tiny suppressed cringe on Yoru's face as he acted so nonchalant in front of her, he couldn't quite bring himself to smile.

"…you know I can go to the village courts and get 'em to reprimand you for verbal abuse, right, sensei?" he said.

"The case would be thrown out," said Yoru, responding as fast as Reido had before.

"You sure?" said Kiba. "I know a guy who'd be real good at lawyer-ing."

Yoru put a hand to her forehead.

"I should have foreseen this," she said.

"What, Yoru-sensei," said Kiba, "you didn't wake up this morning and think: 'You know, today I'm gonna get into an argument with a thirteen year-old'?"

"I have read files on your clan," said Yoru, ignoring him. "They were prodigious and talented."

"And now most of 'em are dead," said Kiba.

She went on:

"The admission of your father to their ranks was a grave error."

Slightly taken aback, Kiba stared at her for a while until eventually he muttered:

"…can't argue with that."

"Coupled with your mother, a combination of their lesser traits resulted," Yoru concluded, and she folded her arms.

Kiba blinked. Then he blinked again. There was nothing in his mind but the weight of Yoru's words, echoing through him as even Hikui and Kohaku stopped counting their pushups and simply stared up at the scene above them. Hikui looked up at him, still mid-way through a pushup, and he looked away so she couldn't see his eyes were sort of watering. To his surprise and slight embarrassment, she seemed to notice anyway.

"Sensei, that's enough," she said.

"Fifty pushups, Hikui," said Yoru, not looking at her.

"That on top of the ones you just gave me, or just adding ten more to 'em?" asked Hikui.

Yoru's eyes thinned a little, and Kiba thought one of them twitched.

"...fifty more," she said.

"Sensei-" Kohaku protested, but Yoru interrupted:

"Remember what I know about you, Kohaku."

There was fear in Kohaku's eyes for a second, and reluctantly he fell silent.

Concentrating very hard on not tearing up, Kiba realised he was not really holding Akamaru anymore, but rather hugging the little dog. To his credit, Akamaru didn't whine even though Kiba was probably squeezing him a little too hard; all his attention was saved for glaring at Yoru.

Was this it? Was his entire ninja career going to be plagued with people who only saw him as 'Ashinoura Part II'? He wasn't that much like his father. In fact, if anything, Kiba was pretty sure he was just his mother except twenty-three years younger and a boy. He'd been told so by Shino and Hinata, and Shino at least didn't seem like a guy who'd pull any punches with him. He was fine with the comparison, though. His mother was tough. She could lead the clan, and if he was going to do that someday, he couldn't afford to be a failure. He was the only male Inuzuka left. He had to be strong in the face of adversity, and he knew he'd face much tougher foes than a woman who was simply insulting him.

But somehow, right now, he _couldn't_ be strong. Looking back on it, he would rather have been in the middle of Hisui again, facing down Gishiki. At least then he had Hinata and Shino and Kurenai for backup.

As he thought this, the wind changed direction, and a scent was carried along by it. It was the scent of cinnamon and flowers, and maybe now a little bit of pine. Kiba knew that scent, and as it passed through to him, it gave him the courage to speak.

"I don't know what problem you got with my dad, sensei," he said, voice loud but still audibly shaking. "Not surprised if you do hate something about him. I don't know, maybe you wanted more from him than he could give you at some point."

Yoru suddenly looked very shocked, and Kohaku and Hikui below her seemed equally surprised, although both also were obviously stifling laughter.

"But my parents had someone before me," he continued, sounding more confident, "and she got nearly top marks in her class. So, I don't know if whatever you say about my parents givin' me 'lesser traits' is true or not, - and again, I know a guy that would know whether you're lying or not – but I know Hana is definitely not a failure."

Yoru raised her chin to better look down at Kiba.

"You're a lot braver when you have others to back you up, Mister Inuzuka," she said.

Kiba was surprised that she'd noticed too, but he was even more amazed at the expression on Reido's face. For the first time in the entire conversation, Reido seemed to have an emotion other than vague interest on her face.

"…sensei," she said, sounding at least a little bemused, "it's a _dog_."

Yoru turned to her, frowning at the statement.

"…no, Reido, I meant Hinata Hyuga," she said.

Happy that he had smelt right, Kiba watched Reido look mortally embarrassed for about half a second before returning to her default position of vague acceptance as Hinata came to his side, looking around at everyone.

"Kiba?" she said. "Wh-what's going on?"

"Hinata Hyuga," Yoru said. "I'd heard you left your clan."

"Then you know she doesn't lie down in front of people who abuse their power, Yoru-sensei," said Kiba.

Yoru didn't look quite so disturbed at this as she had been with Kiba's earlier implication, but perhaps she was getting used to him. Kiba made a note to get progressively more and more annoying whenever he met her, and happily put Akamaru back on his shoulder and stuck his hands in his jacket pockets.

"We can't afford to waste any more time here," Yoru said eventually, possibly having run out of emotionally scarring things to say. "Hikui, Kohaku. You can finish those tomorrow."

"Mm'kay," said Hikui as she pushed upwards.

"Hikui," warned Yoru as Kohaku got up.

Hikui looked to Kiba and rolled her eyes, then turned back to Yoru and smiled politely.

"Yes, Yoru-sensei," she said, attempting to not sound exasperated.

The squad walked off after their leader, Reido following Yoru quite close behind, Hikui and Kohaku trailing as far from Yoru as they could manage. As they left, Kiba could have sworn Reido turned back and looked at him and Hinata for the briefest second, but he wasn't sure whether that was just wishful thinking on his part or if it actually happened.

"Wh-what happened?" asked Hinata.

"Long story," said Kiba.

Sizing her up, he noticed she had dirt all over her pants and on her t-shirt, she smelled slightly of chakra, and there was still a little red in her cheeks.

"What happened?" he asked.

She put her hands in her pockets and looked somewhere around his shoe level.

"…nothing," she said.

"You talk to 'nothing'?" he asked.

Hinata looked away, but Kiba could tell she was smiling.

00000

Shino moved his hands around the shinobi bag, checking for any hidden traps in it. Given that it was a gift from his father at his last birthday, he doubted it was booby-trapped, but checking your possessions was a lesson that the Academy had drilled into him long ago, and he didn't think it was worth the risk using an unchecked bag. In two days, he would enter the chunin exams, and who knew what they would entail?

Once he'd finished going over it, he stepped back from the desk and looked around his room, wondering about what equipment was absolutely necessary. After a minute or so of thinking, his train of thought was interrupted by a sharp knock at the door and a rustle in Shino's kikai.

"Enter," he said.

The door opened, and as Shino had guessed, it was Zangai. His handler stepped into the room and watched calmly as Shino found his extra pair of sunglasses, then eventually spoke.

"You weren't at the hall," Zangai said.

Shino looked up at his handler for a second, then went back to the bag, carefully placing the extra sunglasses in the side pockets.

"I was studying," he said, buttoning the pockets back up. "Preparation for the chunin exams receives priority over food."

"Indeed," said Zangai.

Getting up to find his kunai, Shino glanced up at Zangai again as he looked around the room. Shino hadn't noticed it until now, but his room was kind of messy; he hadn't cleaned it properly in some months and his books were no longer in any kind of reasonable order. It was far from Kiba's room's level, but he was fairly sure it was a bit far gone by Aburame standards.

When he came back from the shelf where he kept his kunai, he found Zangai watching him.

"You've entangled yourself in a dangerous situation," he said.

Shino shrugged a little.

"It is the only way to progress," he said, setting the knives down on the table.

"I meant your involvement with Hinata Hyuga's insurrection," said Zangai.

Shino thought that that was what he had basically meant anyway, and said in what he hoped was a reassuring tone:

"I am aware of the consequences of my involvement."

"No-one can be aware of all the consequences of an action-"

"Then I will prepare for what I consider likely," said Shino.

Zangai kept silent for a moment while Shino put a pen and paper into the bag, but then spoke again.

"The test will be difficult enough for the others, but for your squad it shall be hardest."

He stepped closer to Shino's desk, and looked over it, adding:

"That forest is a proving ground, and the penalty for failure is severe."

"Death?" asked Shino, not looking up.

"_Yes_, Shino," said Zangai, his normal stoic demeanour somewhat collapsing, "hidden villages from all over the world regularly send their best genin thousands of kilometres to die in a forest."

Shino thought on the comment as he took extra shuriken from the desk drawer and put them in the bag. Zangai resorting to sarcasm meant he was clearly exasperated, but the fact he was even telling Shino this meant he couldn't have been that annoyed at him.

He looked up at his handler.

"So death is not certain?" he asked.

"Death is always certain," Zangai said, "but you will not die in the forest."

"Then that is acceptable," said Shino. "I can handle injuries."

He went over to the shelf by his bed for his bingo book, and had only just found it when Zangai said:

"You may not only suffer physical injuries. Metal injuries are also probable."

Shino turned around.

"Mental injuries," he said, trying to avoid sounding bitter. "Do you think I am unexperienced with those?"

Zangai seemed to think carefully before he spoke.

"Your mother's death?" he asked.

Shino considered this.

"Before then," he said. "When I began my training program."

Zangai pushed his glasses up.

"Your training program is and was legal," he said.

Shino stepped forward.

"I-" he began.

He caught himself in time, stopped moving, and took a slow breath. When he spoke again, he was quieter.

"I am aware it is legal," he said. "But I do not consider it just."

He went back to his bag and put the bingo book in.

"Few things in this world are just," said Zangai.

Shino looked up at him.

"So we should abandon justice?" he asked. "It is simply too much effort to help the weak, so we should leave them to their fate?"

Zangai pushed his glasses back up to the top of his nose, and stood straighter than before.

"I would not expect you to understand at your age," he said.

Shino pushed the bag away from him, and stood up to make eye contact with Zangai.

"At my age?" asked Shino. "You and the other handlers seem inconsistent as to what age I am supposed to act like, Zangai. You have taught me to act and think as an adult does for the greater part of my life, and yet whenever I suggest anything that goes against your common wisdom, you remind me that I am a child."

"You _are _a child," Zangai said. "A child with a considerable skillset and great intellect, but a child nonetheless. The lessons we imparted on you are to give you a advantage. They are a shield against what happens to ninja."

Shino held his hands as steady as he could, fighting the urge to ball them into fists.

"And what happens to ninja, Zangai?"

"Danger and pain and impossible choices," Zangai said. "We have given you means to survive, but if you truly intend to follow Hinata Hyuga's example and leave the clan because of a spike in hormonal sentimentality, then have the courage to follow through with it."

There was a long silence.

"Leave my room," Shino said.

"You-" Zangai began, but Shino spoke louder.

"I _order_ you to leave my room, Zangai."

Zangai remained still for a moment, then bowed slightly.

"…very well."

He left and shut the door, and Shino let himself fall onto the bed, sighing. This couldn't end well. According to Aburame law, he did have a right to order Zangai to leave his room, but it would hurt his chances of being taken seriously by other higher-ranked Aburame. It would look like a tantrum to everyone, a meaningless act of rebellion.

Shino swallowed, and focused again. The exams were a few days away. He'd probably gotten little result from arguing with Zangai, but he felt like he had at least said something to someone.

Staring up at the ceiling, Shino slowly raised a hand, and on his command a dozen or so kikai flew out of his body. Flying noiselessly around his outstretched arm, Shino flicked his hand upwards a little lazily, and they all flew up to the ceiling. Moving his fingers around in circles, the kikai flew in round patterns, making shapes against the nearby lights.

00000

For the first two days that she lived in Kiba's house, Hinata slept on the couch.

This was not because there was a lack of rooms to sleep in. Even though Kiba's house was only a tiny fraction of the old Inuzuka compound, it was clearly built with a big family in mind; there were six fairly large bedrooms all up, and that wasn't counting the rooms that had once been bedrooms but had been changed into other things. (There was a whole room filled with dog toys, for example, and another one Hinata and Kiba stumbled upon contained several hundred very old-looking bottles of sake.) Hinata had asked to sleep on the couch because she'd heard other people did it sometimes and was curious as to how it felt, and she'd noticed that Tsume didn't seem to think that much of her. She was polite, of course, and she obviously wouldn't have let her stay in her house if she hated her, but Hinata could tell the dog kunoichi was purposely keeping herself a little distant.

After the second day, and Hinata privately admitting to Kiba that her back really hurt, the two genin found a room that still had a bed in it, and Hinata moved what little things she had over there. The room's paint was a faded beige and judging by the faintly musty smell it hadn't been used in years. The shelves were empty, as were the drawers save for a very surprised-looking mouse, but it did have one redeeming feature: a giant, very clear window that looked out onto the grounds in front of the house.

It was through this window that Hinata looked late that night, staring at the almost-full moon. She'd moved her pillow to the opposite side of the bed so her head lay near the window, and she lay there late at night, watching the night wind make waves through the grass.

There was a creak from her door that made Hinata jump, and she quickly rolled over in bed and got up, wondering whether she should take to sleeping with a kunai under her pillow. She wasn't all that certain about the idea (_what if I accidentally stab myself in the face while I'm sleeping?_), but given what had happened lately, it could grow on her.

To her relief, the entrant into her bedroom was only Tsume, coming back late from a mission.

"Hinata?" she said.

"...h-hello, Tsume," she said, concentrating quite hard on not calling her 'Lady Tsume'.

Tsume looked around the room.

"Not on the couch anymore?" she asked.

"U-um...K-kiba and I found this room," she said.

Then, remembering, she added:

"A-and we also found a room full of sake, and Hana marked it with a pen."

Tsume smiled.

"Great!" she said. "I've been looking for the sake room for ages."

Her eyes flicked to the wide-open window, and then she asked:

"Aren't you really tired? You've been training all day."

"How-" Hinata began.

"Smell," Tsume explained.

Hinata nodded. In the week or so she'd spent with the Inuzukas, she'd learned one thing very well: they tended to talk about peoples' scents rather than what they looked like.

"Don't blame you, though," said Tsume, walking over to the window. "This was actually my room when I was a kid."

"Oh," said Hinata. "I'm s-"

"You don't have to be sorry for not wanting to sleep on a couch," said Tsume, looking back at Hinata.

"O-okay," said Hinata.

"You say sorry a lot," commented Tsume.

"I-I know," Hinata said. "Kiba says I shouldn't say it so much."

"That figures," said Tsume.

She turned around completely and left the window, looking down to Hinata. Neither said anything, but both knew what kept them apart, and when Tsume broke the silence, she seemed tired, stressed and apologetic.

"Look," she said, "it's not...well...it's-"

"You don't l-like me," Hinata said.

Tsume stared at her.

"B-because you don't like my father," she added.

The older kunoichi rubbed at her chin, not meeting Hinata's gaze.

"No," she said. "It's more how...you really look like your mom. And you do the same things that she did, sometimes. And having you around, it's like seeing her ghost, but...different."

Looking back down, she muttered:

"S'kinda pathetic, really..."

"Y-yeah, it is," said Hinata.

She realised too late that she'd said it a little louder than she'd intended, because Tsume seemed to snap out of her daze at hearing it. The dog-nin looked at her, a surprised and thoughtful look on her face, and Hinata slowly worked out what she was going to say next.

"...I-I'm sorry you miss my mother," she said, "but I'm not her. She's gone, and I'm glad you r-remember her as well, but...sometimes you need to let go of things."

There was a moment where the air hung still, and then a whoosh as Tsume reached forward and hugged Hinata, much faster than Hinata had ever expected.

"I'm sorry," she heard Tsume say. "Can't believe I treated my best friend's kid like that..."

"Best friend?" asked Hinata as Tsume finally let go of her. "Y-you and her were _best_ friends?"

The look in Tsume's eyes gave Hinata the answer as soon as she finished asking the question. She _was_ close to her mother, probably closer than anyone else, and from the silence that followed where Tsume was just staring at the bed again, it'd been a long time since anyone had asked her about it.

"You know," she said, "I met your mom and Kiba's dad at around the same time. Neither of 'em were from Konoha. Kiba's dad came from a little village – and I mean an actual tiny village, not like our village. Your mom came hundreds and hundreds of miles to marry your dad. They'd been engaged for seven months by the time she got to Konoha."

"Why'd she travel so far?" asked Hinata. "W-why was she engaged to my father for so long?"

Tsume smiled, a glint of light in her eye, and whispered:

"Your mom was a princess."

Hinata folded her arms and frowned at Tsume.

"T-Tsume, j-just because I'm a twelve-year-old girl doesn't mean I'm going to fall for stories about princesses," she said, sounding slightly sullen.

Tsume smiled, which annoyed Hinata because that meant she thought she wasn't being serious.

"I know," said Tsume, "I didn't like stories about princesses when I was your age either. But I'm being serious. Your mom actually was a princess."

"Mm-hmm," said Hinata, doubtful.

"Well, no-one ever called her 'Princess Hikari'," Tsume clarified, "she would'a hated that. She didn't much like bein' called 'Lady Hikari' either, but that was more accurate. Anyway, her parents ruled a country, so as far as I'm concerned, she was a princess."

_A whole country?_

"W-which country?" Hinata asked.

"It was called the Land of the Sun," said Tsume, "a long way west of here. I'd never heard of it until Hikari told me about it. They wanted quicker and better trade routes through the Land of Fire, and the Hyuga clan agreed to help them if they shared profits. Your parents marrying was the seal on the pact."

This was news to Hinata. She'd always assumed her parents got married for some kind of political reason, being that her father was the firstborn son of the clan leader, but she had no idea it was because of a business deal. Thinking about it that way, it made the whole thing sort of mundane.

_At least my mother was still a princess_, she thought. _Wait, that means_-

Tsume apparently read her mind, because she added:

"It's gone now, though. Got taken over in the war."

"Oh," said Hinata.

"Sorry, kid," said Tsume, ruffling her hair. "You don't get a whole country to yourself."

"I d-don't…" Hinata began. "…actually, now I think about it, I kind of would like a whole country."

Tsume smiled at her, and stroked her cheek with her hand.

"You really do look a lot like her," she said. "If you had pupils, you two'd look almost exactly the same."

With that, Tsume stood up.

"We'll talk about your mom more later, okay?" she said. "Right now, you should go to sleep."

"Okay," said Hinata, and Tsume drew the curtains around the window closed.

Bidding Hinata goodnight, she left the room, shutting the door behind her. She then stopped at door next to Hinata's room.

"And go to bed, Kiba," she said.

"I'm in bed," said Kiba, voice slightly muffled.

"Then go to sleep," she said.

"What're you talkin' about?" said Kiba. "I've been asleep this whole time."

"So you're not sitting up under the covers reading _Real Ninja Stories_?" she asked.

"…of course not," said Kiba. "Having said that, goodnight."

"'Night," said Tsume.

00000

Hikari walked behind Hiashi and Hizashi Hyuga, with their father Higashi in front of them.

_At least my name fits in pretty well, _she thought.

The meeting with her future husband had gone as well as it could have, considering the fact that her father-in-law was the most intimidating man she'd ever come across. He had an iron gaze that seemed to hold you in place even across a room, and he hadn't actually said anything about Hikari's joke about marrying twins, he'd looked pretty angry in a stern way afterwards. Leaving the village's centre, the group followed the clan head through various roads, all decked with giant trees, the fallen leaves scattered across the road in some places, and raked into gardens in others.

Behind the twins, she saw who she thought was Hizashi nudge Hiashi with his hand. Hiashi looked over at his brother, and Hizashi then made a few quick movements with his hand. At first she thought Hizashi was performing a jutsu, but after nothing apparently happened, she realised he was saying something to Hiashi in a hand-signal code. Whatever he said, Hiashi didn't seem to approve of it, shaking his head. Trying again, Hizashi moves around his hand in a different way, and eventually Hiashi reluctantly spoke.

"Father?" he said.

Higashi waited a moment, then spoke.

"You may speak," he said.

"Would it not be prurient to permit Lady Hikari to consider the village's geographical layout before she enters our compound?" asked Hiashi.

Hikari was impressed; it took genuine talent to say that many elaborate words in one breath, and fairly formerly as well. Higashi stopped walking and turned around to address his children.

"Why do you consider this necessary?" he asked.

Hizashi nodded a tiny bit at Hiashi, who said:

"I am of the opinion that the mother of future heirs to the clan should be aware of our village holdings as soon as possible, father."

'_Mother of future heirs'?_ thought Hikari.

She hadn't really thought about it, but as things were, she supposed she would have to get pregnant at least once. Her parents had been vague on the whole thing, and courtiers had refused to explain to her anything other than the basics of pregnancy. She hoped she wouldn't have to get pregnant too soon, though. She was only fourteen, anyway.

"Surely your fiancée is tired from a long journey," said Higashi.

"No, Lord Higashi," said Hikari, bowing to him.

This was apparently a breach of etiquette, because Hikari heard the twins behind her wince slightly, although Higashi's face was unchanging.

"We would be safe, father," said Hiashi. "We have a bodyguard."

Higashi looked at Hizashi for a moment.

"So you do," he said.

With this, he left the children, and they stayed in place until he was basically out of sight.

"Alright," said Hizashi, "let's go."

Hikari and Hiashi followed him as he left the path they'd been taking for a dustier sideway, Hikari slightly behind the other two. She still wasn't quite sure if she could easily tell which twin was which, being that they were dressed more or less identically.

"So," said Hizashi, "welcome to Konoha. I'm guessing Kegawa Inuzuka's squad took you here?"

"Yeah," said Hikari, wary of his interest.

"Didn't have much to say about us, did he?" he asked.

They passed the giant statue with three enormous faces carved into it, which neither of the twins batted an eyelid at. Hikari wondered what it was for or what it meant, but she could ask about that later.

"He called the Hyuga compound a nest of vipers," she said.

Hizashi laughed, while again Hiashi didn't so much as smile.

"That _is_ a pretty good one, Hiashi," said Hizashi.

The corners of Hiashi's mouth reluctantly curled upward, as if he was coaxing himself to laugh.

"Considering an Inuzuka said it, it is fairly witty," he said.

Giving up on his brother for the moment, Hizashi looked back to Hikari.

"That's the first thing you have to learn about Konoha, Hikari," said Hizashi. "None of the clans like each other. We're at war."

"We haven't been at war for years," said Hiashi dismissively.

"You know what I mean," said Hizashi.

"So you're fighting the Inuzuka?" asked Hikari.

"Actually, we're in multiple business partnerships with them," said Hizashi. "They're excellent shinobi – trackers, mostly – which means they can locate lost shipments with great ease."

"Marriage of convenience?" suggested Hikari.

Hizashi laughed.

"The only Inuzuka-Hyuga marriage that'll ever happen," he said. "We hire them and they help us, but nobody in either clan likes one another."

"Mother says they're lower-born," commented Hiashi. "No Hyuga would be willing to marry one."

Hizashi waved a hand.

"Mother says _everyone_ is lower-born," he said. "She probably includes father when she complains about 'lower-borns'."

Hiashi folded his arms.

"We are children of the lotus," he said, almost defensively.

"As you say, brother," said Hizashi.

They came to the end of a street, which opened up into a wider road.

"Any other clans I should watch out for?" Hikari asked.

"Uchiha," said Hiashi, staring forward.

"Yes," said Hizashi, "the Uchi-"

Now he saw it, and Hikari followed the twins' line of sight over to a group of teenage boys on the other side of the road, sitting on a rock.

"…ha," he finished.

The teenage boys all wore blue-ish jackets with a red and white symbol on the back that Hikari guessed was their clan's symbol. The older ones seemed to be smoking, lighting their cigarettes by performing some kind of fire jutsu. What seemed like the youngest looked up and pointed at the twins and Hikari, and there ensued a kind of staring contest standoff.

"Can't we leave?" Hikari whispered.

"No," said Hizashi, keeping eye contact, "they've seen us. Walk behind us and don't look scared."

Hikari swallowed.

"Easy enough," she said.

Shuffling behind the other two, Hikari followed the twins until they were fairly close to the Uchiha, although still much further away than would be normal for talking to someone. It was here Hikari noticed that the boys all had slightly red eyes. She recalled reading that there was a clan in Konoha other than the Hyuga with a dojutsu; perhaps this was the Uchihas'. Either way, they were less weird to her than Hyuga eyes.

One of the boys, a lithe-looking one with rolled-up sleeves and short hair, raised up his cigarette to the three as if he was toasting them with a wine glass.

"Hyuga," he said.

Hizashi gave a tiny nod of their head, like a miniscule bow.

"Uchiha," he said.

The boy took a casual drag of the cigarette, coughed and spluttered, seemed to consider taking another puff, then apparently thought better of it and held it away from himself, leaning back.

"I thought we told you to never come around here, Hiashi," said the boy.

"I'm Hizashi," said Hizashi, "he's Hiashi."

"And how am I meant to remember that?" asked the boy. "Or care?"

"Forehead," said Hizashi.

The boy looked around.

"Haruno's not here," he said.

Hizashi rolled his eyes.

"No, Uchiha, my forehead protector," he said. "Hiashi never wears his."

_Oh_, thought Hikari.

"Fine, _Hizashi_," said the boy. "Not like you bother to remember our names."

"You're Izamu," said Hizashi. "And you two are Katsu and Fugaku."

Izamu chuckled.

"Wow, Hyuga, you spend all night remembering that?" he said.

"It's more of a drill from my handlers," he said. "I've been told 'stay away from Izamu and Katsu Uchiha' every day for the past month."

The boy that Hizashi had called Fugaku looked a little sullen, which Hizashi noticed.

"Don't worry, Fugaku," he said, "I'm sure you'll be well known as a troublemaker eventually."

Fugaku scowled, and muttered: "Shut up, Hyuga."

"No, Fugaku," said Izamu, poking him on the shoulder. "For some weird reason, _this_ Hyuga isn't so bad."

"Sorry," Fugaku said quietly.

Izamu slapped him on the head.

"**No**," he said, "we don't apologise to a Hyuga, even if it is Hizashi. They'll get all high and mighty on us. Pay attention, man!"

Fugaku looked about ready to apologise again, but then caught himself and fell silent once more.

"You know you'll get in trouble if your dad finds out you're here," said Izamu. "And if Jiro comes 'round…"

Hizashi shrugged, and sat on a rock beside the boys. Less confident, Hikari sat next to Hizashi, on the opposite side of the Uchiha, and Hiashi leaned on the rock, as far away from the Uchiha as he could manage.

"Okay, whatever," said Izamu.

He gestured at Hikari with his cigarette.

"Who's she?" he asked.

"My brother's fiancée," Hizashi answered.

Izamu frowned.

"…Hiashi?" he said.

"I only have one brother, don't I?" asked Hizashi.

Izamu stared at Hiashi in disbelief.

"You're marrying her?" he asked, incredulous.

"Correct," said Hiashi.

Izamu smirked. Looking back at the other Uchiha, he mouthed 'Correct' in an imitation of Hiashi, and they all chuckled. Hiashi tried to make no expression at all at this, but he didn't quite manage to hide his annoyance.

"Damn, son," said Izamu. "What the hell're kids doing now to get so lucky? Fugaku's engaged already."

"Izamu…" said Fugaku, whining a little.

"Though, she _is_, like, ten," said Izamu.

Fugaku shoved at him.

"Izamu!"

"Oh, suck it up," said Izamu. "few years wait and you're good to go. My parents haven't found me a girl."

"You can't get one on your own?" asked Hikari.

Izamu seemed a little taken aback at the question, but recovered fairly quickly.

"Ah, it'd just be easier if they did it for me," he said. "Plenty'a girls around, though."

"Maybe you're not lazy," said Hikari. "Maybe you just suck at dating."

"That so?" he asked. "You want a demonstration?"

The look in his eye and the timbre of his voice made the implications unmistakable, but Hiashi didn't seem phased at all that Izamu had just flirted with his fiancée, and Hizashi wasn't looking all that surprised at what had just happened. What's more, Izamu was looking at her expectantly. He genuinely thought he might have gotten a 'yes' from her.

_Is Hiashi that spineless that everyone knows he won't even care?_ she thought.

"Don't think so," she eventually said. "You know, I just got here. I'd rather not catch anything _immediately_."

Katsu and Fugaku broke into laughter and Hizashi chuckled a little, while Hiashi just rolled his eyes as Izamu tried to protest.

"Hey, shut up!" he said. "Come on, I got training."

Getting up and patting down his pockets to make sure he had everything, the teens all suddenly fell silent as a tall, broad-shouldered man stood in front of Izamu and glared down at him.

"What the hell are you doing with Hyuga?" he asked Izamu.

"Uh…" said Izamu, "um…ah…hi, Jiro-"

Jiro backhanded him, knocking his cigarette out of his mouth and sending him staggering backwards.

"I leave you five minutes and you're having a slumber party with the Hyuga head's sons and some other whore?"

Hikari stepped forward, fists at the ready, but Hizashi and Hiashi held her back, and she could only watch as Jiro gestured at Fugaku.

"And you took Masaru's brother with you?" he said.

The other boy, Katsu, raised his hands in protest.

"C-come on, Jiro, he got engaged-"

"What're you putting in those cigarettes, Katsu?" Jiro thundered. "You guys brought Fugaku. If Fugaku tells Masaru, Masaru tells Kiyoshi, Kiyoshi tells Lord Noboru, and then all of us get blamed for it."

"I'm not gonna tell him," Fugaku said, louder than he had been before.

Katsu and Izamu looked pained at this outburst. Jiro was clearly someone with whom you didn't speak out of turn. This time, however, he didn't hit Fugaku, simply pointing at him harshly.

"You'd better not," he said, "or I'm coming after you and that kid you're marrying."

Fugaku gulped, and Jiro remained there for a while, staring at him. Eventually, he turned away, and everyone seemed to breathe a sigh of relief.

"Yeahp, you're sure gonna prove how tough you are by beating up a ten year old," said Hikari at his back.

The boys around her all winced as Jiro turned around.

"What?" he said.

"I think you heard just fine," said Hikari. "Jiro, is it?"

Jiro stepped towards her, the other Uchiha boys parting to let him through.

"Yeah," he said, now quite close to her. "I have no idea who you are, but-"

There was a great flash of light from beside Hikari, and then there were three strikes at Jiro from Hizashi's hand, so quick that they all blurred into one. For a moment, they seemed to do nothing, and Jiro turned his head to deal with Hizashi. He began to raise a hand, but suddenly he stumbled, and slowly he fell to the dusty ground, like a great felled tree.

Hizashi looked down at Jiro, then up at everyone else. For a long moment, everyone just stared at him.

"…_run_!" he shouted, and everyone followed the command, racing away from the collapsed Jiro, passing by buildings and stalls.

"What happened to that guy?" asked Hikari as they flew past what she thought was a ramen bar.

"Gentle Fist," Hizashi said.

Hikari dodged a messenger, who was going at an equally fast speed but in the opposite direction, then asked:

"What?"

"It's our clan jutsu," said Hizashi. "It paralyses the chakra field in part of the body through touch."

Skidding to a stop, the six ninja found themselves in a crossroads, and all gathered around in a vague circle.

"Will Jiro be okay?" asked Katsu.

"I hit him pretty hard, but he'll be up and fine in a little while," said Hizashi. "In other words, be careful for a while."

Izamu gasped for breath before he spoke.

"We won't tell anybody if you don't," he said.

"Fine," said Hizashi.

Nodding, the Uchiha went down one path, and Hizashi went the opposite way. Jogging to catch up to his quick strides, Hikari watched as the two brothers shared a brief look, and thought about the twins.

She decided that if Hizashi was so eager to get away from his father, Higashi was probably fairly strict. Probably, neither could be themselves unless they were out of his earshot. She could even see it now: Hizashi was walking with a fair more confident stride than Hiashi, who stood quite straight but seemed stiff in his movements. She knew well enough that if you wanted to know people, you had to see what they were like when their parents weren't around.

"You know," she said, after a few minutes of silence, "you guys all didn't exactly act like enemies back there. Until Jiro showed up, you were all pretty much buddies."

"Maybe," said Hizashi. "Maybe we'll all end up best friends and bake cupcakes together."

_Already dropped the formalities_, thought Hikari. _How come I'm not marrying him_?

"Fine, whatever," said Hikari.

"It is like Izamu said," said Hiashi. "People from other clans and commoners seem to be most fond of Hizashi, but he is an exception to normality within our clan."

"Really," said Hikari.

"Oh, yeah," said Hizashi. "I'm a real snowflake back at the compound."

"You know," she added, looking at Hiashi, "Hizashi's pretty quick on defence."

"Oh?" asked Hiashi.

"Yeah," said Hikari. "He jumped in to save me really fast. Faster than anybody else I've ever seen."

Hiashi said nothing, but nodded politely, and Hikari forced herself not to curse in frustration. This guy was something else, all right.

_I'm gonna have to be even __**more**__ obvious_.

She put a hand to her forehead.

"You know that Uchiha guy was flirting with me, right?" she asked.

Hiashi considered it.

"Yes," he said.

"Well…" said Hikari. "Do you care?"

Hiashi took a suspiciously long time to think this through, and when he finally answered, it sounded as if he'd been practicing saying it for a while.

"I don't know what you expected when this marriage was arranged, but I can assure you that provided you are not impregnated, I am ambivalent to your personal interests," he said.

Hikari stopped walking, frozen in her tracks by sheer amazement at what Hiashi had just said.

"'Provided I'm not impregnated?'!" she asked. "What is _wrong_ with you?"

Hiashi stopped and looked back at her.

"If you are impregnated, unwanted children will result," he said. "This would be embarrassing for the clan and you. If you avoid pregnancy, however, your liaisons are your affairs."

Leaving Hikari with her mouth open in shock, he added as he started walking again:

"This is ordinary for a politically expedient arranged marriage."

"Really?" she said, going after the twins. "Hizashi, are you married?

Hizashi scratched at his arm, apparently reluctant to join the conversation. Slowly, he said:

"Yes."

"And would you be fine if your wife went off with some random guy?" asked Hikari.

"…no," said Hizashi.

She looked back at Hiashi with a questioning face, but he shook his head.

"Hizashi's marriage is different," he said.

"Different?" asked Hikari. "Different how?"

Hiashi sighed.

"You are…"

He swallowed, and looked at the ground as he finished speaking.

"…you are too young," he said.

Hikari stared at him. He briefly held her gaze, but then looked away and kept walking.

"Too young?" she said, running to catch up with him. "_What?_ I mean, you're _how_ old?"

"Sixteen," he said, not looking at her.

"Oh, wow, sixteen," said Hikari. "You're so _ancient_ compared to me. Maybe you'll die of old age and leave me as a grieving widow."

"I don't expect you to understand," said Hiashi.

"Good, 'cos it makes no sense! You were fine with what Izamu said to me, and how old's he?"

"Seventeen," said Hiashi. "But that is his business."

"You don't care about me, do you?" she said.

"I never said that," said Hiashi. "I merely said you may-"

"I know what you 'merely said'," said Hikari.

She suddenly realised how cold it was here, and shivered a little bit. Behind her, Hizashi spoke.

"It'll be warmer in the compound," he said.

"Great," said Hikari.

They kept walking. Hikari kept behind, but Hizashi went alongside his brother. Although Hikari didn't know their sign-language, she got a sense of what Hizashi was telling his brother by the way he looked at him. Hiashi responded in sign language this time, until Hizashi finally gave up and sighed.

"You baffle me sometimes, Hiashi," he said.

Hikari folded her arms, staring at the ground.

"And I'm gonna have kids with _you_?" she asked.

Hiashi said nothing.

000000

The old man sat on a tree branch, surrounded by empty bags. He'd taken a risk going to Ichiraku's, but hey, he missed the place. Knowing that little Ayame (who would have been what, four? five?) was now an actual grown-up woman was something he still hadn't gotten over. Plus, the shio was still really good.

He stared out from his perch onto the great expanse of green in front of him, sniffing at the air. He had a good sense of smell, even though he had long since been separated from what gave him that good nose in the first place, and he could tell that while there were tigers, panthers and any number of giant snakes around, there were no other people in the Forest of Death.

The stage was certainly set for the Chunin Exams. He'd seen shinobi of every kind passing through the village: Sand Ninja, Cloud Ninja, your standard weirdos from the Land of Sound, even a set of genin that looked and acted a hell of a lot like Inoichi Yamanaka, Chouza Akimichi and Shikaku Nara (although Inoichi's copy was a girl). The security was tighter than normal too. Normally he could more or less slip through the village gate with barely anyone noticing; this time he'd had to take the long way 'round and brave the Living Forest. He'd left a few tracks and a candy wrapper or something, but he didn't think anyone would actually go in there and check. Leaf ninja were so wary of the Living Forest, it barely even appeared on any maps of the village.

Opening up a bag that was still full, he sighed a little as he pulled out a rice ball. It'd be nice once he could leave the village. He didn't get paid for doing this (one occupational hazard of being lackey to a rogue ninja), so he had to steal his way through more or less everything. That was no trouble, because he had no problem with it morally and he could pick-pocket with the best of them, but it was a major pain having to sneak into rich peoples' houses, and he was getting too old to successfully woo the _really_ loaded trophy wives.

"What happened to the magic, huh?" he said to himself.

That was a habit of his, probably not a good one when you were a spy. Still, he wasn't trained from birth like some others he knew, he wasn't a science-obsessed freak like Gishiki, and he wasn't…well, he certainly wasn't whatever the hell Kamakiri was. He was an ordinary guy, as far as he was concerned.

Shrugging at his lot, the old man bit into the rice ball, and it tasted so good he let his disguise melt away. No one'd be out in the Forest of Death so early, and even if they were, nobody would recognise him now. The giant scar on his face was new, as was the haircut and clothes, and most of the people old enough to remember him were probably dead. They might realise he was rogue, but they'd never figure out he used to be a Leaf shinobi.

"Nice to be home sometimes," said Ashinoura Inuzuka.

00000


	9. Rediscovering Things Long Buried

Greetings, loyal readers and new ones alike. Well, three months between chapters is actually pretty good for me, and just in time for Christmas Eve, too!

Really, though, this chapter took so long because I was intent on getting through the entire Chunin Exams arc in one chapter. I didn't quite manage to do that, but hopefully what happens will entertain you.

00000

_Chapter 9: Rediscovering Things Long Buried_

The councillors stood when Hiashi entered the room, but he didn't for a second believe that they did it out of respect.

Not all of them were present, and those that were were the ones least inclined to support him on anything. Akemi and Hachiro were present, which in a full Hyuga council session would be troubling enough, but the real concern was the presence of Hideki.

Hideki Hyuga was the kind of man who inspired loyalty in a select chosen few and anger in virtually everyone else. He was a tall man, and built less thin than the average Hyuga male; he had fought quite valiantly in the Third Great Shinobi World War, and had retired from active shinobi duty to pursue clan politics.

People had a great deal to say about Hideki. As far as most Hyuga were concerned, he was a herald of a return to the clan's prior form, a throwback to a time when the Hyuga were exorbitantly rich and incredibly powerful. When Higashi Hyuga ruled the clan with a stern paternal hand, when the queenly Kimiko Hyuga sat at his side, when that soft-hearted spendthrift Hiashi Hyuga and his reckless twin brother were safely too young to do anything that would seriously harm the dignity of the Hyuga.

The branch house members, on the other hand, had somewhat less esteem for Hideki Hyuga. True, they were probably being sarcastic when they told their children that the _namahage_ demons were only hiding out in the mountains because they were scared of Hideki, but that was the branch house: black humour until the end.(1)

"Lord Hiashi," said Hideki, bowing slightly as Hiashi sat.

"Councillor Hideki," he said, watching the seated Hideki carefully. "Your messenger said you wished to discuss the future of Hinata in this meeting."

Hideki gave a smile that reminded Hiashi of a tiger in the grass, lying in wait.

"The future of Hinata in particular, Lord Hiashi," he said. "And the future of the clan in general."

Opening a blank scroll and writing the date on it, Hiashi said:

"You have the floor for the standard time allowed, Councillor."

Hideki stood, bowing brusquely to the other councillors and making a show of brushing his robes before going out onto the floor before him. Addressing all councillors, he began to speak.

"I have recently received information from my daughter regarding a minor altercation she had with Hinata," he said.

"Altercations, within the clan or outside it, are meant to be reported to the clan leader," said Hiashi. "Why have I not heard of this before?"

"It seemed a trifling thing to place onto you as a burden, Lord Hiashi," said Hideki.

Hiashi's eyes thinned.

"Continue," he said.

"Hiroko has informed me that Hinata is capable of Gentle Fist," said Hideki.

There were shocked looks all around the councillors and their assistants, yet Hiashi remained poker-faced.

"Do you have any witnesses to this, apart from your daughter?" he asked.

"Two, Lord Hiashi," said Hideki. "Hoshi, the daughter of Haruki, and Naruto Uzumaki. Both Hoshi and Hiroko witnessed Hinata use the Byakugan, and from their description, her chakra-points were strong and sharp."

"I see," said Hiashi.

Councillor Akemi stood.

"It is interesting that it happened now, of all times," she said.

"'Interesting'?" asked Hachiro, the councillor next to her. "It's unheard of. She has had no training in the matter for years, and no serious development in her skills since she developed the Byakugan. And how long ago was that?"

"She was six, councillor," said Orora. "That is quite young to have developed the Byakugan."

Hachiro paid little attention to this. Assistants, after all, were not meant to be there to speak.

Hiashi rested his chin on his steepled fingers. Hyuga didn't usually gain Byakugan proficiency until they were nine or so, but Hizashi had achieved it when he was seven. Coupled with the fact that Neji was more capable than any other branch house member at Gentle Fist, was it possible that Hinata wasn't his-

Hiashi swallowed involuntarily.

"Lord Hiashi?" Orora said.

Hiashi waved an arm and tried to look like nothing had happened.

"Regardless of how unlikely it is, our fears have been realised," said Hideki. "A rogue Hyuga is capable of using Gentle Fist."

"My daughter is no rogue," said Hiashi. "She remains loyal to Konoha."

"That is irrelevant in comparison to how she has treated the clan," said Hideki. "Her departure was a severe loss of face for the Hyuga."

"Non-Hyuga sympathies appear to lie with Hinata," said Akemi.

"Non-Hyuga sympathies are irrelevant," said Hideki. "What is a concern is the potential use of Hinata as a weapon against us."

_She is no weapon_, thought Hiashi. _Though if she were, it would be a weapon the world has not yet heard of_.

"You seem fixed on the idea my daughter betrayed us, Hideki," said Hiashi. "Are you _experienced_ in such matters?"

For a brief moment, Hideki scowled quite deeply, but then just as quickly went back to his look of smug silence. He was too secure in his own status to risk losing face, Hiashi knew that by now.

"She must be returned to us," said Hachiro. "Regardless of her capabilities with Gentle Fist, Hinata is fragile."

"No," said Hiashi. "Not anymore. She is much stronger than any of us had anticipated. Convincing her to return will be difficult."

"Then we should let her prove her strength," said Hideki.

He looked to Hiashi.

"She is taking part in the Chunin Exams, yes?" he asked.

"…that is correct," said Hiashi.

"So is Neji, the son of Hizashi," Hideki continued. "Do you know of the progress of your nephew, Lord Hiashi?"

Hiashi did know, but it would not be tactical to let the councillors know that. He was already known for being rather more sympathetic to the branch house than was expected of a clan leader.

"He has been training for some time since he graduated from the Academy," he said.

"A full year, Lord Hiashi," said Hideki. "Neji is taught by a fool, and his squadmates are a cripple and a civilian, but rest assured, he is a powerful shinobi. They will succeed in the Forest of Death, that much is certain. Would you say your daughter's squad will do the same?"

_Yes_, thought Hiashi. _If any squad has sufficient tenacity, if not actual talent, then Hinata's squad is it_.

"I am uncertain," he said.

Hideki gave a light chuckle.

"Are you concerned about the Inuzuka?" he asked. "They are naturally quarrelsome, but even if Hinata is too weak to heel him, the Aburame will-"

"He will not," said Hiashi. "Those children are…exceptional."

"Then you _are_ certain they will reach the final round of the Chunin Exams?" Hideki asked, stepping closer to Hiashi's seat.

Hiashi decided he had to remain noncommittal until he knew more of Hideki's plans.

"It is possible," he said.

"Very well," said Hideki. "If things are as you say, then I propose this: we arrange a battle between Neji and Hinata."

There were assorted mumbles and gasps of surprise, mostly from the assistants of the councillors. Akemi and Hachiro themselves took this news quite stoically while Hideki glanced around the room, carefully counting whose support he could count on.

"That's illegal," Orora said.

Hideki frowned at Orora for speaking out of turn, a loss of control that made Hiashi much happier than he thought would have.

"My assistant is correct," said Hiashi. "That is illegal by village law."

"Hyuga operate by clan law," Hideki said.

"Which we alter at our convenience?" asked Hiashi, eyebrows raised.

"Exactly," said Hideki. "Should we arrange a battle between them, there are two possibilities. The more likely outcome is that Neji defeats Hinata. She will be upset, and more inclined to an apology for her recent behaviour. It will give her a more realistic understanding of her abilities. The other possibility is that Hinata defeats Neji. Should that happen, she will be temporarily sated, but then, soon, she will curious to develop her jutsu. Only a Hyuga can teach Gentle Fist. Either way, she will return to us."

"I agree," said Akemi. "We can't afford to have Hinata as a rogue element."

"And we will once again have an heiress," added Hachiro.

Hiashi's thoughts turned to Hanabi.

"The clan still _has_ an heiress," he pointed out.

"Yes," said Hideki, "Hanabi."

Akemi cleared her throat.

"We are aware your youngest daughter is a proficient kunoichi," she said, "but your removal of Hinata from the line of succession was doubtful in its legality, Lord Hiashi."

Hideki nodded at this.

"The rules are clear," he said. "Eldest is first. You of all people should know that, Lord Hiashi."

Hiashi was impressed by exactly how little what Hideki said affected him at all.

"I know it well," he said.

_And I would spare Hinata that pain._

"It is not certain that Hinata's squad will reach the final stage of the chunin exams," he said.

"That possibility has been considered," said Hideki. "Rest assured, they will reach the centre of the Forest."

Hiashi was beaten. Whether it was the haughty air that he cultivated and that inexplicably made other people sink to their knees to beg to do his bidding, or the fact that he bribed very, very well, Hideki held the power of the council.

"In this matter, I am assured of nothing," said Hiashi.

Standing to leave, Hiashi rolled up his scroll and walked out without looking back, Orora following behind him. Returning to his office, he made quite sure the door was completely closed before sitting down at his desk, staring out the window.

"I'm sorry, Lord Hiashi," said Orora, standing before him.

"No, Orora," said Hiashi. "I am. Sit."

Orora did so.

"It's a good plan," said Hiashi. "If Hinata wins, the strongest Branch house member gets put in his place, and the prodigal daughter with a grudge against me returns to the clan."

Putting the unfinished scroll in the top drawer of his desk, he added:

"If she loses, her will is broken."

"How can we counter it?" asked Orora.

Hiashi stroked his chin.

"Hideki is intelligent, but too confident," he said. "He thinks too little of Hinata or her squadmates to consider them capable of reaching the forest centre on their own, so clearly he has an inside man that will help them in some fashion. At present, he considers me easy to manipulate, and he presumably thinks the same of Hinata. If she is heiress again, my work with Hanabi will be in vain."

Pulling a new scroll from his desk, he began writing on it.

"Orora, what do you know of Hideki's daughter?" he asked.

"Ah..."

Hiashi looked up from the desk at Orora.

"What?"

Orora coughed, and said:

"It would be improper for me to cast aspersions on the moral character of a fourteen year old girl, Lord Hiashi. Suffice it to say, she very much takes after Hideki."

"I see," said Hiashi, standing up as he finished writing. "Based on my experience with Hideki, she will only have befriended one kind of person: someone who is _like_ her, but not quite as competent."

"…Hoshi?" asked Orora.

"Exactly," said Hiashi. "I need to find her and question her."

"You, sir?" asked Orora. "Personally?"

"Yes," said Hiashi. "For now, by myself."

He held out the scrap of paper to Orora.

"I need you to find Hinata and give her this message before she enters the Forest of Death," he said.

Orora looked uncertain.

"If that is discovered-"

"I am aware of what will happen if we are found out," said Hiashi, "but informing the village officials of what Hideki has done will only make our position here more fragile."

Slowly nodding, Orora took the paper, carefully folded it, and put it in his pocket. Thinking more on what had been said, Hiashi spoke again.

"Hideki also mentioned Naruto Uzumaki," he said. "Do you know anything about him?"

"He is the container of the Nine-Tailed Fox, Lord Hiashi," said Orora.

Hiashi closed his eyes in annoyance.

"That information would be enlightening were I a fifteen year-old, Orora, but I am already aware of that," he said. "I am interested in his personal character."

Orora shrugged.

"From what I have heard and seen, he appears to be unintelligent, boisterous and mostly ineffectual," he said. "However, there was word that he successfully stole an important scroll from the Hokage's office a month or so ago. What's more, his sensei is Kakashi Hatake."

"What of it?" asked Hiashi, looking at him again. "The copy-cat ninja also has Sasuke Uchiha on his squad, and it is traditional to put the lowest and highest-ranking ninja together."

"True enough," said Orora. "Yet, what Uzumaki lacks in intelligence or skill he may have made up for in raw power. Kakashi is no doubt aware of his potential."

"Perhaps," said Hiashi. "His presence as a witness when Hinata used Gentle Fist is unusual. Considering her apparent affinity for the Inuzuka, do you think Hinata has befriended him?"

"...I'm afraid I don't follow your logic, Lord Hiashi," said Orora.

"The Inuzuka set themselves against the world," said Hiashi. "Hinata has rebelled against the clan. It is possible she considers outcasts like Naruto Uzumaki or Kiba Inuzuka to be kindred spirits."

Orora suddenly avoided Hiashi's gaze.

"That seems a viable explanation," he said.

Hiashi's eyes thinned. Orora was usually very reliable, but he was also known for occasionally being economical with the truth. Still, there was no time to pursue this right now.

"Very well," said Hiashi. "Go, quickly."

Orora complied, standing to leave. As he reached the door, however, he turned back to Hiashi.

"Perhaps we've pushed her too hard," he said.

Hiashi shook his head.

"No," he said. "Everyone has a breaking point. They become stronger once they pass it."

Orora looked doubtful as he walked out of the room.

00000

The shuriken flew from Hinata's hand, spinning rapidly as it missed the target and landed a few inches below, embedding itself on another branch of the tree next to three other shuriken. Two branches above it, three of Hinata's kunai were stuck fast to the tree, and next to them, a perplexed-looking bird peered at the metal intruders and cawed.

Slumping with defeat, Hinata walked over to the tree and pulled the shuriken and kunai out of the bark, the bird hopping away as she collected her weapons again. She'd left early so as not to wake Kiba and had been at this for most of the morning. She didn't want to practice this at home, or at the Inuzuka compound, anyway. She got the feeling they'd try and help her out, and for some reason she tried not to think about, she didn't want their help here.

_I should be better at this_, she thought.

Hyuga were meant to have better eyes than everyone else, and the Byakugan was her squad's ace-in-the-hole – while it was on, nothing could sneak up on them. Sure, Kiba had a good sense of smell and Shino had his bugs, but they were not nearly as exact as the Byakugan. A good Hyuga could throw shuriken and kunai in any direction and hit targets hundreds of metres away.

Hinata, on the other hand, could hit the wrong part of a tree, and that was it.

Stepping back to start the practice again, Hinata experimentally activated her Byakugan and turned around. Holding a kunai up with her right hand, she brought it down swiftly and let go, under-arm throwing it. It missed the target again, skidding on the grass and coming to a stop on a rock.

"Damn it," she muttered.

She went over to the kunai and picked it up. She pulled some grass from the ground and sliced at it with the kunai to test its sharpness. It was still working; the armourer she'd brought them from was clearly as good as his reputation suggested.

Then there was a flash of orange in her peripheral vision, and she instinctively turned around to see it for herself. Naruto was by the road, apparently waiting for someone.

Hinata put the kunai back in its holster.

_I should talk to him_, she thought.

She brought her hands up to her chest and pushed her fingers together, feeling her cheeks grow hot again.

_Definitely._ _While there's no-one else there._

He glanced around the road, face lit up by bright sunlight, and she became increasingly aware of how blue his eyes were. She attempted to step forward, and slowly it happened, yet the closer proximity to him made it even harder to stay composed.

_It's not fair. Why is he so handsome? He should be less handsome – but not too much, just a little bit. So I could talk to him more easily._

Purely by accident, Naruto looked around the road and his eyes seemed to meet hers.

_Stay calm stay calm stay calm stay calm stay calm!_

She took a shivering hand up to her face and pinched at it, but it didn't seem to help; she was pretty much stuck there by her own nervousness.

What was happening? She was fine the last time she'd seen him! She even touched him then, and she would have finished the conversation with Naruto all graceful and smooth if he hadn't accidentally touched her arm. (Though, as things to end conversations went, that was certainly not one she was complaining about.)

She almost spoke then, but she saw Sakura appear up the road, and before she could call out to Naruto he'd hurried over to her. She switched off the Byakugan; it was too late now.

_I'm a coward_, she thought.

That was the feeling that possessed her mind for much of the day. Through the entrance into the room with the hundreds of other hopeful genin, in the examination room, where she'd quite luckily been seated near someone who knew the answers, to the great forest beyond a tall wire fence, light barely entering the wooded domain.

_I'm a coward._

"Hinata?"

She looked up from the ground and shifted her toes; the grass beneath her was soggy, and it poked into her sandals. It'd been Shino that had spoken. They were some way off from the main group of people, all clutching their forms to enter the Forest.

"Wh-what?" she said.

"You've been staring at the ground and frowning all day," he pointed out.

Shino kept a level gaze at her as she thought on how to answer. Kiba looked up from his form, Akamaru sitting on his shoulder.

"...yes?" she said, trying to sound nonchalant.

"And that's Shino's job," said Kiba. "What's up?"

Hinata pushed her fingers together, wary of sounding like a broken record.

"I-it's the same as always," she said. "I try and talk to Naruto, b-but-"

"It just seems impossible?" asked Shino.

As she nodded at this, she noticed that Shino's eyes had flicked away from her and to some distant point over her shoulder. She wasn't game to look behind her right then, but she had a fairly good idea of who he was looking at.

She forced herself to pull her fingers away from each other and stuck her hands in her pockets.

"M-maybe if you two were there..." she began.

Kiba looked uncertain, and shook his head.

"No," he said. "That's like having a chaperone."

"N-not necessarily," said Hinata. "I m-mean, I'm not going to a-ask him to marry me or anything while you two are there. Y-you can just help me make friends with him."

Looking even more uneasy, Hinata watched Kiba as he took Akamaru from his shoulder and held him in his arms, patting the little dog as his expression changed. He looked a lot more troubled than usual; while he normally acted as if he didn't care at all in the face of danger, here he seemed cautious, maybe reproachful.

Hinata thought back on how he'd acted around Naruto. A few days ago, he'd purposely avoided being there when she 'accidentally' ran into Naruto; could he have left them alone for reasons other than avoiding being a third wheel?

"K-kiba," she ventured, "do you have something against Naruto?"

He stroked Akamaru's chin.

"No," he said.

Then, apparently unsatisfied with that simple of an answer, he added:

"Kinda. I don't know, ask me again some other time."

With this, he lightened up, and managed a fairly genuine-looking smile, even in the face of Hinata's concerned expression.

"Go on," he said, "go find him. He got a cut on his cheek from Anko; maybe you can nurse him back to health."

Hinata looked at him sideways.

_There's more here than he's willing to admit_, she thought.

"Alright," she said. "I'll see you two soon."

Folding up her form, she walked away from them, disappearing into the distant crowd. As she left, Shino spoke.

"Do you think what Anko and the others have said is true?" he asked. "About the Forest, I mean."

"Eh," said Kiba. "It'll be tough, but nothing we can't handle. It's probably mostly talk to scare off the people whose hearts aren't really in it."

Grinning at Shino, he added:

"Or the ones who don't know when to quit."

Shino nodded at this.

"We've some experience in that matter," he said.

Suddenly, Kiba nudged him.

"Look," he said, pointing to the crowd. "See that girl with the blue hair?"

Shino followed the line of Kiba's index finger and found the target: three Konoha genin, possibly a little older than him. The blue-haired girl Kiba mentioned was excitedly talking to a tall purple-haired boy, while a girl with glasses and green hair looked on blankly, silently clutching a book.

"Yes," said Shino. "What of her?"

"Her name's Hikui," Kiba said. "You think she's cute?"

Shino considered how to respond to this, and eventually came up with what he thought was an effective solution.

"My opinions on her cuteness are at present irrelevant," he said. "How do you know her?"

"She kicked a ball into my face a few days back," said Kiba. "She seemed sorry about it, though...wait, they've seen us."

Hikui and her squad had seen the two shinobi standing apart from the crowd, and the three of them stepped around other ninja, walking towards Shino and Kiba.

"What of the other two members of her squad?" asked Shino.

"Well, the guy in her squad's okay," said Kiba. "He's called Kohaku. He can go through stuff."

Shino looked at him.

"'Go through stuff?'"

"Like, solid objects," said Kiba.

"You mean he's intangible?"

"Sure, whatever," Kiba said. "Anyway, him and Hikui're fine. But the girl with the glasses..."

He thought on how to sum her up.

"Imagine girl-Sasuke," he said.

"Ah," said Shino.

They stopped talking then, for the squad was close enough now that they could be heard easily. As Hikui stepped by the tall grass, she finished talking about shuriken with Kohaku and brushed her hair out of her face, then stood in front of Kiba.

"Hey, Kiba," she said.

Looking slightly lower, she added:

"And tiny dog."

Akamaru barked in appreciation.

"You made it," she said.

"Pfft," said Kiba. "Fake exam? Saw right through that from the start. This' Shino, one of my squadmates. Shino, this is Hikui, Kohaku and Reido. I met 'em a few days ago."

Kohaku and Hikui both waved, while Reido seemed to spend barely two seconds sizing Shino up before returning to her default state of blank stare. Shino nodded at the three of them.

"Hello," he said.

"Hey," said Hikui, pointing at him, "you're an Aburame."

Shino looked down to his pale green jacket with the high collar and looked up at his frizzy hair and sunglasses.

"Yes," he said.

_How observant of you_, he thought.

"We didn't have any Aburame in our year level," said Hikui. "Actually, I don't think we have any clan-members at all."

"No," said Kohaku, "we have Neji."

Hikui shrugged.

"Whatever," she said. "Anyway, you control bugs, right?"

Surprised that anyone was this interested in him, Shino stood up slightly straighter before answering.

"Yes," he said.

"Can we see?" asked Hikui.

Shino decided that they weren't quite ready to discover the secret of the kikai, but there was still something he could do without giving that away. Crouching down, he held a hand out towards the ground and concentrated. Slowly, the assorted insects of the grass came under his control, and gently he impressed on the flying ones the importance of going up. They were harder to control than the kikai – they had no singular purpose, all separate minds – but they followed his command nonetheless, and as he stood up, dozens of tiny bugs flew around his hand, making patterns.

He held out the hand to Hikui and Kohaku, both of which watched it with interest.

"_Awesome_," said Hikui.

Shino nodded his appreciation. He held the bugs there for a little while longer, but when Kiba nudged him he guessed that by now he was showing off, so he let the bugs fly away.

It was then he noticed that Reido was staring at him.

"You have committed a tactical error by revealing your abilities," she said.

"So?" asked Kiba. "I already know from meeting you guys what at least Kohaku can do."

"And your squadmates were already aware that I control insects," noted Shino.

Reido seemed unimpressed.

"You could have chosen to neither confirm nor deny," she said.

"That would be needlessly evasive, considering they are unaware of the actual extent of my abilities," Shino said. "This was a social nicety."

"Social niceties are unimportant," said Reido.

"Forget her," said Kohaku, "she's always like this."

"And yet she is mistaken," said Shino. "Social niceties are of supreme importance in terms of disguise and tactical retrieval of information, for if a reconnaissance ninja does not understand cultural norms, they run the risk of detection."

Reido thought about this for a long time.

"…I should go and glean more information," she said, and turned around and left.

Turning away from Kiba and Shino to see her go, Hikui laughed as she watched Reido stiffly walk through the grass. Shino looked at Kiba to see if he'd done well or not, but Kiba seemed...distracted. Once Hikui turned back towards him, however, Kiba returned to normal.

"Nice," Kohaku, who'd been watching the whole scene with quiet interest. "You out-Reido'd her."

"Members of my clan are extensively trained in how to take a long time to say anything," said Shino.

Then, curious, he asked:

"I've never heard of an intangibility jutsu before."

Kohaku smiled a little, and smoothed down his hair.

"Yeah, it's not exactly common," he said. "Forgive me if I don't say much more than that right now."

Shino inclined his head.

"Understandable," he said. "Is this the first time you've done the chunin exams?"

"Yeah," said Kohaku. "Don't worry, you can survive them. Trust us, we're experts."

"Experts at failing them," said Hikui. "Anyway, we'll see you guys 'round. We should probably find Reido before she runs off or something."

"She'd do that?" asked Kiba.

"She's sure hard to find sometimes," said Kohaku. "Later."

With that, the other genin left.

"Good work," said Kiba, hitting Shino on the arm for some reason.

"Doing what?" asked Shino.

"You talked to them pretty good," said Kiba.

It was a mark of Shino's growing restraint that he didn't correct Kiba's grammar.

"I suppose," he said. "I thought I talked too much. You barely said anything to either of them."

Kiba laughed.

"That's fine," he said. "I talk most of the time anyway. Besides, I was happy to just sit back and watch."

"So I noticed," said Shino.

Kiba grinned at this, apparently without shame.

"You're lucky Hikui didn't see you," said Shino.

"So I am," said Kiba.

Shino put a hand to his forehead and sighed.

"What?" asked Kiba. "I'm a guy, aren't I?"

Shino folded his arms.

"Do you not think we are, perhaps, slightly too young to be entering relationships?"

"'Course not," said Kiba, putting Akamaru on his shoulder again. "We need to hurry up. Someday, we'll be too old for this, and you'll regret not taking the time now."

"What," asked Shino, "when we're fifteen?"

"Yeah, the impossibly ancient age of fifteen," said Kiba. "Anyway, c'mon. Let's go find Hinata."

Walking together, the three of them entered the crowd.

00000

In retrospect, Hinata realised how lucky she was to find Naruto alone. Talking to him in the presence of his squad would be close to impossible; Sasuke would no doubt consider this an unwelcome intrusion, and Sakura...well, Hinata tried to avoid thinking about Sakura.

She'd checked in the crowd of people first, and using the Byakugan to search, she'd noticed several things. Firstly, almost everyone except the rookie ninja was armed to the teeth. Secondly, more than a few bags were made of a material that the Byakugan couldn't see through. Thirdly, thought it hardly seemed possible, Ino Yamanaka was even more of a Sasuke fangirl than Sakura was.

_Shino won't like that_, thought Hinata as the blonde tried to pull Sasuke away from Sakura.

After it became clear that Naruto was not in the crowd, Hinata tried looking on the outskirts of the zone, and eventually noticed a shock of orange in a clearing. Stepping around the trees, she turned off the Byakugan so as not to alarm him and called out to Naruto, sitting on a rock.

"N-naruto?" she asked, loud as he could manage.

Naruto swivelled around on the rock, and smiled, waving.

"Hey, Hinata," he said.

"H-hey," she replied.

Slowly, inching forward, she realised that it wasn't nearly so hard to approach him now. He was looking at her thoughtfully, hands out at his sides to steady himself, with the cut that Anko's kunai had given him still looking quite fresh, albeit not too severe. She also saw that his forehead was looking rather red, although why, she couldn't immediately tell. Approaching him, she bunched her hands up inside her pockets so she wouldn't pull them out and twiddle them, and stood before him.

"Um-" she began.

"I'm sorry," he said, very quickly.

She frowned in confusion, wondering what _he_ had to be sorry about.

"A-about what?" she asked.

"Uh…" said Naruto. "What happened a few days ago?"

Seeing her confused look, he continued:

"Uh…well…uh…after that girl hit me with Gentle Thing, and you helped me up, I was…but...I didn't mean to, but I kinda-"

"Oh!" she said, blushing as the realisation hit. "N-no, Naruto, that's fine."

"Okay," he said. "Good."

The ice hopefully broken, Hinata took another step forward.

"Y-you have a cut on your cheek," she said. "Do you want a b-bandage for it?"

Naruto shook his head.

"Naah," he said. "Thanks, but havin' a scar is gonna make me look cool."

Hinata privately wondered if a cut that thin would even scar anyway, but she didn't want to disappoint him. There was something in his voice, or maybe in his eyes, that told her something was bothering him.

"So..." said Naruto. "How're you?"

Boggling at how quickly the conversation had become smalltalk, Hinata answered:

"F-fine."

Naruto nodded, the same slightly sad look on his face.

"Sakura said you live with Kiba now," he said. "I guess you're both really good friends for that to happen."

Hinata's eyes widened with panic and surprise. Had Sakura told him...

..._what_ had she told him?

"Yes," she said. "B-but I'm..."

She rubbed at her neck, and continued:

"...I _am_ j-just friends with him."

Naruto seemed to be trying to make no expression at all.

"Okay," he said.

Despite his best efforts, Naruto's voice didn't quite manage to stay level, and both the children seemed to notice it. Looking away, neither noticed that the other was redder in the face than they had been before.

After making sure her blush had died down, Hinata spoke again.

"Um..." she began. "A-are you and him...K-kiba...did something happen between you?"

Naruto shrugged.

"Why don't you ask him?" he asked. "He's in your squad."

"H-he doesn't seem to like talking about it," said Hinata. "B-but I _know_ you two used to be friends, and then you j-just...weren't."

Naruto looked down, and put a hand up to his head as he thought.

"I guess I could tell you," he said. "...but...do you _really_ wanna know?"

Hinata took a step closer to him. He looked up at her.

"I want my friends t-to be friends with each other," she said.

Naruto smiled, and she smiled back.

"Okay," he said, sliding off the rock and onto the ground. "You might wanna sit down, this could take a while."

She immediately complied, kneeling next to him as he leaned up against the rock.

"It was a long time ago," he began. "I was seven. Or maybe eight. Around that old, anyway. I was in my room, tryin' to go to sleep..."

He smiled, remembering.

"You know how it's really hard to go to sleep when you're a kid?" he asked.

Hinata nodded knowingly, and he went on.

"Yeah, I had that problem a lot," he said. "So I was lying in bed trying to sleep while my dad was up working. He usually did missions all day and paper stuff at night, so I spent most of the time going through Konoha by myself. Iruka told me I really look like him, though I act more like my mom."

Hinata's smile faded.

"D-did your mother-"

"Yeah," he said. "I think she died when she had me. Dad didn't talk about it much, but sometimes he said I reminded him of her."

"Mm-hmm," said Hinata.

He looked into her eyes for a few moments, and to her surprise, she felt calm when it happened rather than nervous.

"Anyway," he said, looking away, "I was in bed, tryin' to get to sleep, when suddenly the lights outside my door went out. I thought that was weird, so I got outta bed to see what was goin' on, then I heard my dad shouting and a lot of noises, like there was a fight. I opened the door and went out to see what was going on."

"Naruto!" Hinata said, horrified.

She stood up on her knees in shock.

"What?" he asked.

"Y-you were seven!" she said.

He considered this.

"Or eight," he insisted. "Besides, I was fine."

"B-but you could have been hurt..." she began.

He shook his head.

"I wasn't gonna let something happen to my dad, Hinata," he said. "Don't worry, I was alright."

"O...okay," she said, sitting back down.

Sighing, he continued.

"I found my dad lying up against the kitchen wall," he said. "There was a lotta blood. I tried to help him, but he told me to run, so I went for the safest place I could think of - the Academy. It was a while before Kiba's dad found me. Him and his dog. Kiba's mom and him smelt my dad's blood, so they went to..."

He suddenly started blinking a lot, and trailed off. When he spoke again, he was much calmer than before.

"Did you ever meet Kiba's dad?" he asked.

She shook her head.

"N-no," she said. "My clan d-didn't let me go out alone much after I learned the Byakugan."

"He was a really cool guy," said Naruto. "Like, kind of if Kakashi-sensei was actually as laid-back as he pretends to be."

Hinata frowned.

"K-kakashi-sensei's not laid back?" she asked.

"No," said Naruto. "Trust me."

"Alright," said Hinata.

"So, Kiba's dad found me in the Academy, and then..."

He frowned, as if searching for something in the recesses of his mind. After a long time of looking, he apparently gave up and said:

"..._something_ happened."

"Wh-what?" asked Hinata.

"I don't remember," said Naruto. "I remember Kiba's dad finding me in the Academy, then..._something_...then he took me to the Hokage's office. The Hokage told me my dad was dead."

She looked down.

"I'm s-sorry," she said.

Staring out at the trees in front of him, Naruto came to a realisation.

"I think they thought it was the Nine-Tailed Fox," he said.

"Wh-what?" asked Hinata.

"It makes sense," said Naruto. "They never caught a killer, I was covered in blood..."

"B-but you were eight," said Hinata. "and your father was a fully-trained shinobi. They sh-should have-"

"I know," said Naruto. "I don't think any of that mattered."

As he finished speaking, he realised Hinata was wiping her eyes on her sleeve, and leaned out to touch her arm. She looked at him in surprise, and he tried to poke the arm in what he hoped was a comforting way.

"Hey," he said. "It's okay. It was a long time ago."

"I'm sorry," Hinata said. "I shouldn't have asked-"

"Don't say that," said Naruto. "You shouldn't be sorry for being nice."

She nodded and leaned sideways, now sitting more naturally rather than kneeling on her heels. He took his hand from her arm, and leaned back against the rock again.

"It's good to tell someone all this," he told her.

"D-doesn't your squad...can't you tell them?" she asked.

"No," said Naruto. "Do you talk with your squad about this kinda stuff?"

She considered this.

"S-sometimes," she said.

"Cool," Naruto said. "Anyway...a little while later, Kiba's dad left the village. He'd always tried to say to them that I didn't do anything, that it was this other ninja, but they never found any proof. Then Kiba and me had a fight. But not, like, a good fight. We didn't even hit each other that much, just shouted. He said his dad left 'cos of me."

Seeing Hinata's upset look, he added:

"But I didn't take it that personally. He was really close to his dad; I saw them together all the time. Anyway, we got over hating each other eventually, but we never fought again."

She looked pensive at this, and eventually spoke again.

"N-naruto?" she said, looking down at her lap. "C-can I ask another question?"

"Yeah?"

Putting her fingers together and poking at them, she asked:

"Why do you like fighting so much?"

That was not what he was expecting.

"Good question," he said.

In his mind, he'd known the answer to that question since he was very, very young. But he'd never been good at speaking his mind, which a lot of people confused with not being good at thinking. (Naruto was quite good at thinking, if he found a spare a minute or two to do it in.) It'd been the answer to a question that nobody had ever asked him, because nobody was interested enough.

Until now. He owed the world an answer, and even if the whole world didn't care right now, Hinata Hyuga did.

"It's harder to lie when you're fighting," he said. "And it's harder for people to ignore you. When it's just you and them, they can't hide behind rules or words or whatever, they have to beat you and you have to beat them. When I'm fighting, it feels like people are watching me, and for once they're not thinking of the fox. They can't see who I am anywhere else, but when I'm fighting, they can tell who I am."

She smiled.

"G-good answer," she said.

Her eyes flicked up.

"Y-you know," she said, "your forehead's all red."

Naruto smiled sheepishly and scratched the back of his head.

"Yeaaah," he said, "I kinda hit my head on the desk in the exam part. Like, eight times in a row."

"Oh," said Hinata. "D-does it hurt?"

He shrugged in what he hoped was a macho fashion.

"Nah," he said.

There, she smiled – whether because she considered him an intractably brave man or because she thought he was ridiculous, he wasn't exactly sure.

What happened next, on the other hand, went a bit too fast for Naruto to make sense of. There was a sudden movement as she almost leapt forward from her sitting position, and a brushing of her hand against his leg as she leaned on the ground near him. Then a sense that her eyes were incredibly close to his, and an odd feeling in the part of his forehead where he was pretty sure she'd kissed him.

Staring in abject bewilderment as she quickly pushed herself away again, Naruto's eyes widened.

"Wh-..." he started.

"S-see you later!" she whispered, and in a second she was out of sight.

By the time Naruto had recovered, she had left the little clearing, and all he could do was put a hand up to his forehead and stare at where Hinata had been.

There was a rustling noise, and he instantly looked up to see if it was her again, but instead he found the rest of his squad. Sasuke had entered the clearing followed by Sakura.

"There you are, Naruto," said Sakura, and it suddenly occurred to Naruto how her scolding tone was something he put up with rather than actually _liked_. "Have you been here this whole time?"

Naruto stared at her blankly, which in less fortunate times might have meant Sakura would hit him on the head. Luckily, she was clinging onto Sasuke's arm without much resistance from the stoic Uchiha, which in Sakura's terms was some kind of heaven.

"We should go," said Sasuke, quite successfully keeping his cool despite having a fangirl attached to his arm like a lovestruck limpet. "They'll be calling us to go into the forest soon."

Naruto blinked to clear his head.

"…oh yeah," he said. "The forest. C'mon!"

He got up from the rock and dusted himself off, not quite sure if what had just happened had actually happened or had just been a bizarre daydream. He walked past Sasuke and Sakura and looked around outside the clearing. No-one else was there.

_Weird day_, thought Naruto.

Sasuke and Sakura exited the clearing, and watched as Naruto silently glanced to and fro.

"What's with him?" asked Sakura.

Sasuke tsked.

"It doesn't matter," he said.

There ensued an awkward silence as he looked at her, clinging to his arm.

"Let go of me," he told her.

"O-okay," said Sakura, and although obviously disappointed, she quietly complied.

00000

Hinata stared down from the tree at the clearing below, cunningly hiding a giant rope net. Kiba claimed he had borrowed it from a random room in his house, which Hinata could quite easily believe, but the question of how he'd managed to carry it this far, or indeed how he knew a giant rope net might come in handy was slightly more difficult.

They had picked a good tree, though. It had a hollow part of its trunk that could fit all three of them quite comfortably, and there was a very solid branch just next to the hollow that any of them could easily stand on.

"Do you think this will work?" she asked, sitting with the others in the hollow.

"If it does, we're golden," said Kiba. "Any squad clueless enough to wander into it'll be ours for the taking."

Hinata stared at another tree on the edge of the clearing, around which was tied what looked like a fairly obvious rope, and knitted her brow.

"It's just...there's no bait," she said.

"Doesn't need bait," Kiba said. "Akamaru sprayed every piece of undergrowth nearby. We're sitting above the only unaffected clearing for some way, so unless a squad really likes the smell of dog pee-"

"Possible, but unlikely," noted Shino.

"-yeah," said Kiba, pointing to Shino, "unless that, they're almost certain to pass through here."

Noting Hinata's sceptical face, he added:

"Trust me. And, don't lean on that, the vines creep up on you."

Turning around to find out what Kiba was talking about, Hinata jumped and gave a little shriek as the vines of the tree nearby snatched at her. She pulled her kunai from its holster and cut them away, then stepped over to where the boys were.

"H-how-" she asked.

"The Living Forest is all around my house, remember?" said Kiba. "The Forest of Death was grown from samples from there."

"Did the First Hokage do it?" asked Shino.

Kiba looked at him, curious.

"…yeah," he said. "How'd you know?"

"Generally speaking, any unusual plant life around Konoha is because the First Hokage did it," explained Shino. "Except why the trees are always dropping leaves."

"You don't know that?" asked Kiba.

"Nobody knows that," said Shino.

Kiba grinned.

"Thought you knew everything," he said.

As all three ninja crouched, Hinata made up her mind to ask Kiba the question that was burning in her mind.

"Kiba," she said. "Why didn't you tell us about your father?"

He looked back at her.

"...huh?" he said.

_Typical Kiba tactic_, she thought, but she went on.

"I asked Naruto why you two don't get along," she said. "He told me what happened."

"Really?" said Kiba, eyebrow raised.

"H-he doesn't hate you, Kiba, he just-"

"Whatever," he said dismissively.

He turned away from her, but she put a hand on his shoulder and wrenched him back to face her, shaking Akamaru and making both Kiba and Shino look surprised.

"Why are you always so secretive?" she asked. "Y-you're f-fine with helping me or Shino, but you don't want us to help you."

Kiba took Akamaru from his pocket and held him in front of him.

"I don't need your help," said Kiba, "or Shino's. _I'm_ fine."

"But we should depend on you?" she countered.

He shook his head.

"That's not what I said-"

"You said in the inn at Hisui that it was obvious I could do Gentle Fist, but you didn't let me fight the Jade Clones," she said. "You keep saying I'm a lot s-stronger than I think I am, but it's hard to believe you when you want to do all my fighting for me. Or d-do you think I should go home and learn to be a wife?"

"Yeah, Hinata, **my** mom raised me to think that's what girls should be like," said Kiba. "She's pretty happy you moved in, though, you being so perfect all the time."

"B-because I thank her?" asked Hinata "You d-don't know how lucky you are, Kiba."

Kiba put Akamaru down and threw his hands up as the puppy scampered off.

"Oh, of _course_, Hinata!" he said, "I _love_ rich people comparing me to the lowest form of life, and everyone in my clan except my mother or sister being dead, and being the son of my dad, who is a walking waste of air."

"Th-then why do you care Naruto made him leave?"

Kiba seemed to have no answer for this, so he just folded his arms and muttered:

"Shut up."

Shino looked from one to the other.

"Can we discuss this elsewhere?" he suggested.

"N-no," Hinata said, folding her arms and sitting away from Kiba.

"We need to function as a team until the mission is complete," said Shino.

"Well," said Kiba, "we're not functioning, evidently."

They stayed like that for some time, Shino's eyes flicking from one of his squadmates to the other.

"Kiba," he said eventually. "I want to know what happened from your perspective."

The dog nin gave him a cynical look.

"Why?" he asked. "Getting all the angles on the problem?"

"You assume I'll lose respect for you," said Shino. "You may have noticed, but I'm entirely aware of the moral failings of Hinata's father, and I've not exactly shunned her."

Kiba's façade crumbled a little at that.

"...yeah," he said. "I guess."

He looked to Hinata.

"What'd he tell you?" he asked.

Unfolding her arms slightly, Hinata spoke.

"One night, h-he found his father bleeding to death, and ran," she said. "Y-your dad found him at the Academy, and took him to the Hokage. Th-they never found the killer."

"Tch," said Kiba, apparently sceptical. "Did he tell you about the ninja that only my dad ever saw?"

"N-no," said Hinata.

"My dad's story was always that he saw the ninja that killed Naruto's dad, but nobody else did 'cos he used a jutsu," said Kiba. "Somehow, that ninja left no trace, nobody ever saw him, there was no scent, nothing."

"Naruto didn't talk about that," said Hinata, "b-but told me he remembers _something_ happened between your dad finding him and leaving the Academy, b-but he doesn't know what it was."

"So my dad tampered with his memory," said Kiba.

"Unlikely," said Shino. "Memory alteration is possible, but it is not a commonly taught jutsu. Only a ninja with advanced medical training could use it, and even then, it's often fairly easy to spot if you know the basics."

"How do you know that?" asked Kiba. "Wait, let me guess: you read medical books in your spare time."

"My mother was a medic-nin," said Shino. "But your guess was right anyway, so you're partly correct."

"Okay," said Kiba, "not likely that my dad'd be good enough to do a memory alteration, but that doesn't mean there was anyone there. My mom was at Naruto's dad's apartment not long after it happened. Yuuto –Naruto's dad – was dead by the time she got there. The only scents she found were him and Naruto's, and she didn't smell anything new when she went to the Academy."

He looked to Hinata.

"Did he say how my dad left to go look for Yuuto's killer?"

"Y-yes," she said.

Kiba slumped back against the trunk of the tree.

"I thought he meant it," he said, staring off into the distance. "When he left, I honestly thought my dad would be back soon, even after my mom and the Hokage and everyone told me he was rogue. Then, after a while, I figured my dad wasn't coming back, because he was gonna spend his whole life chasing down this one ninja, and it was Naruto's fault. I started treating him like everyone else in the village did – probably worse – but that didn't make me feel any better, so it didn't last long. Soon enough, I realised. He hadn't gone rogue for anybody but himself."

He glanced at Hinata and Shino, then kept talking.

"That's why I haven't told you guys about my dad," he said. "Whatever bad stuff happened to you two, it happened 'cause someone else tried to change you into something neither of you were. Bad stuff happened to me because I was weak."

Hinata shivered. Hearing Kiba talk like that was..._wrong_. It was the kind of thing that her or Shino might say in their darker moments, but Kiba wasn't like this.

"Y-you're not weak-" she began.

"I bullied a guy whose last surviving parent had just died," said Kiba. "Kinda makes me a coward, Hinata. I've been hiding behind an idea. People think 'nothing ever fazes Kiba, Kiba can take anything and he'll just laugh about it'. That's the guy you've been talking to all this time. A fake."

He looked over to Shino to find the bug-nin staring at him.

"Sorry how I turned out," Kiba said.

Shino stared for a little while longer, until he knew what he had to say.

"Liar," he said.

Kiba blinked.

"What?" he asked.

Shino crouched before him, hand out on the tree to steady himself, and looked Kiba in the eye.

"You lost someone," he said. "Like me, like Hinata. Not to death, but to disappearance, and that is worse. Your father leaving you was impossible for you to deal with alone, so you buried yourself in being an Inuzuka, like how I buried myself in being an Aburame."

"What do you mean?" asked Kiba.

"I read," said Shino, "you fought. You were one of the best at the taijutsu part of the genin exams, I believe. I tried to become stoic and unflappable and the perfect ninja, you tried to become rebellious and careless, to become good at being a ninja without even trying. I learned kikaijutsu at a level years ahead of any other Aburame my age, you got Akamaru four years before you were meant to."

"So?" asked Kiba.

"Lately, I've stopped overachieving with my studies," said Shino. "I used to read every night, now I only do so here and there. I have stopped trying to be serious all the time. I told my minder Zangai that I cared more about helping Hinata against her clan than I did my own advancement."

Hinata stared at him.

"Y-you do?" she asked.

"Yes," he said. "And yet, I have _not_ stopped being an insufferable know-it-all. That is my destiny. To casually tell people useless information, to always remain a little out of step with the rest of the world, to wear beige jackets, and all the various accoutrements expected of a member of my clan. These are parts of me that I accept, but will no longer obsess over. I've

stopped trying to be the best Aburame, and in the process have become a better person."

Kiba looked at him, silent but thoughtful, as Shino continued.

"What I'm saying is your life has _not_ thus far been an elaborate act to hide the fact that you are a failure of a person," said the bug-nin. "It's not true that nothing ever fazes you, but you handle danger exceptionally well. You cannot be casual all the time, but you don't see much point in formalities and you never have. You _were_ a coward when you hurt Naruto, but you only prove yourself weaker by never trying to heal things between the two of you."

Both the shinobi kept their eye contact, waiting for Kiba to speak. He blinked, and raised a hand to his face, then slowly moved his hair out of his eyes.

"I'm more than my clan," Kiba said, voice growing in certainty. "And my parents."

He looked to Hinata.

"All of us are," he said. "You're both right. I can't let something that happened so long ago hang over my whole life."

Hinata smiled.

"G-good," she said. "_Kiba-niisan_."(2)

Kiba's smile broke into a grin, and he stood up on the hollow.

"Let's see if we've caught anything," he said, and he walked out onto the branch.

Then, just as rapidly, he stopped in mid-step and jerkily turned sideways, facing forward.

"Kiba?" asked Hinata. "A-are you alright?"

"Stay there," he said, and only his face moved.

Realising what was going on, Hinata and Shino leaned back into the hollow as far as they could as Hinata activated the Byakugan. Before Kiba and below the tree was Squad Ten, standing right in the target area of the net, as Shikamaru controlled Kiba's body using his shadow jutsu.

"Standing up was probably not the best idea," Kiba said.

Shikamaru shook his head, smirking as he held Kiba captive.

"Kiba, Kiba," he said.

Thinking on it, he then added:

"Kiba. We've got you dead to rights."

Hoping to stall for time, Kiba looked around nervously for inspiration.

"Uh..." he said. "...how 'bout that Anko, huh? She sure doesn't wear a top!"

Hinata rolled her eyes and looked back to Shino.

"Are boys _ever_ going to stop talking about that?" she whispered.

"Naruto shirtless," Shino whispered back.

Blushing furiously, Hinata stammered out:

"_Sh-shut up_."

"Nice try, Kiba," said Shikamaru. "We'll take your scroll, thanks."

"Aw, too bad, Shika," Kiba said. "We lost ours."

Ino stepped out from behind Shikamaru, and pointed at Kiba.

"Yeah, right, Kiba!" she said. "You're on the squad with two geniuses."

Her blush suddenly fading, Hinata poked at Shino's shoulder.

"She thinks you're a genius," she whispered.

Poker-faced, Shino responded:

"...yes, what of it?"

Hinata's smile had far too much of an air of 'I know your deepest darkest secret' for Shino's liking, so he busied himself with sending out a kikai to scout the area.

"Yyeaah," said Kiba, "you're right, Ino. I could never think of something clever, like, I don't know-"

He struck a dramatic pose and shouted:

"-_pretending to be stuck in Shikamaru's shadow but really I'm just a clone_?"

This didn't work all that well, as Shikamaru regained control almost instantly and pulled Kiba back to mimic Shikamaru's pose.

_Ow_, Kiba thought. _Shikamaru has terrible posture._

Choji nudged Shikamaru.

"You're losing him," he said.

"Quick," Shikamaru said to Ino, "possess him."

"Wh-what do we do?" asked Hinata.

Shino pulled the kikai back to him, and retrieved its information.

"We should throw a kunai at the rope holding the net," he said.

Hinata nodded.

"A-alright," she said, "you do it."

"Why me?" Shino asked.

Hinata looked down.

"I'm n-not a good shot," she said.

"Hinata-" began Shino.

"Sh-shino, I _know_ we've made a lot of breakthroughs today b-but just trust me: for now, I c-can't hit that rope with a kunai."

"...alright," said Shino. "I don't think I can hit it from here, though."

"Okay," said Kiba, now held even more rigid in the shadow of Shikamaru, "so you called my bluff on me actually being a clone."

"I can't use my shadow on clones or genjutsu, genius," said Shikamaru.

"Thanks," said Kiba, "Good to know. One other question, though: d'you ever wonder where Akamaru got to?"

The white-haired puppy suddenly burst out of the bushes behind Squad Ten, and in a whirlwind of fur and claws knocked Shikamaru down to the ground. Noticing Kiba break free of her squadmate's shadow, Ino shouted 'Catch me!' and made a hand sign, just as Shino leapt out from behind the tree and threw his kunai at the rope on the other side of the clearing. Slicing through its target, the kunai fell to the ground as Squad Ten were pulled up from the grass by a now-visible rope net, swinging in the breeze.

Kiba stared in wonderment at the sight of Squad Ten tangled up in the net, and asked the world in general:

"...how come every time I use Akamaru, somebody else has yet another plan?"

Hinata stepped outside of the tree and commented, Byakugan still on:

"It worked, though."

"Yeah," said Kiba. "Still, seems kind of redundant."

Far beneath them, Shino stood up and spoke in a voice that sounded a little strange.

"Not quite," he said.

Kiba and Hinata looked down at Shino, then looked at the lifeless body of Ino in the net.

"Oh crap," said Kiba.

The form of Shino picked up the kunai that had been thrown at the rope and stood beside the rope net.

"Alright," said Ino-controlling-Shino, "Kiba and Hinata, here's how we're going to do it."

Kiba snickered.

"What?" asked Ino-Shino.

"You said we were gonna do it," said Kiba.

Ino-Shino rolled her eyes.

"Grow up, Kiba," (s)he said.

Kiba laughed.

"Wow. Shino with Ino's...like, habit-thingies-"

"Mannerisms," said Shikamaru, face sticking out of the bottom of the net.

"-mannerisms is hilarious," Kiba finished.

Hinata hit him in the arm with the back of her hand.

"K-kiba, this is serious!"

"Right," said Kiba, "sorry."

"_Uh_," said Ino-Shino, annoyed (at which Hinata had to put her hand to her mouth to stifle giggles). "Here's the deal: you cut my squadmates down and give us your scroll, or Shino gets it."

"Gets what?" asked Kiba.

"I'll hurt him."

"Oh."

Shino's form seemed to lose balance for a second, and it spoke with Shino's normal voice.

"Hinata, help," said Shino.

"H-how?" asked Hinata.

"Hey!" said Kiba, incensed. "What'm I, here?"

Ino regained control, and answered:

"Annoying."

_Actually,_ thought Shino,_ he's grown on me in the time I've been part of his squad._

_Really?_ asked Ino.

_Yes. I'd never expected it, to be honest._

_Ugh. You know, I was almost married to him once?_

Even though he knew full well what Ino meant, Shino was still shocked enough to pause for a second before asking:

_...what?_

_Arranged marriage,_ she explained. _My clan's small, and his clan's smaller. We figured we'd just make a bigger clan._

_Oh,_ thought Shino. _But it fell through?_

_It fell through 'cos we didn't get on at all,_ she said._ Then again, we were both nine._

_You were married at nine?_

_We were engaged at nine, but like I said, our parents broke it off. Dad worked out I'd always want to be with Sasuke._

_Ah._

_What do you mean, 'ah'?_ asked Ino in an outraged tone.

_Somehow I suspect he has no interest in..._

_Girls?_

_People._

Outside of Shino's mind, Shikamaru, Choji, Kiba and Hinata watched with interest and curiosity as Ino-Shino sat there in silence with her brow furrowed.

Kiba looked to Choji and Shikamaru.

"Is...is this normal for you guys?" he called out to them.

"Yeah," said Shikamaru as the net slowly turned around.

"She possesses somebody and it's talk, talk, talk," complained Choji.

"Shut up!" said Ino-Shino. "I'm having a conversation here!"

Kiba looked to Hinata.

"Hey, Hinata, could you-..."

Hinata didn't respond, instead simply staring at Ino-Shino.

"Uh," said Shikamaru, noticing Hinata's lack of movement, "Ino-"

"Not now, Shikamar-" began Ino-Shino, but (s)he was interrupted with enough Gentle Fist strikes to tranquilise an elephant.

Ino-Shino fell to the ground, making an indent in the grass as both its occupants winced.

_Ow_, thought Ino.

_Yes_, agreed Shino.

"Kiba," said Hinata, emerging from behind Shino, "get their scroll."

Kiba stared at her for a few seconds before realising, and quickly jumped over to the rope net. Finding the scroll hanging from Choji, he put it in his backpack and dropped down.

"Is it a Heaven Scroll?" asked Hinata

"Yeah," said Kiba.

Shikamaru called out from above them.

"This isn't over," he said.

"Never said it was, but you're gonna need to find another scroll now," said Kiba. "C'mon, Hinata. Shino."

The two genin taking their comrade by the arms, Kiba and Hinata dragged Ino-Shino away from Shikamaru and Choji, then chakra-jumped up to the treetops, leaping away.

Ino attempted to make Shino's arm rise, but it barely moved.

_What's happening?_ she thought.

_I'm guessing your jutsu has a maximum range,_ thought Shino.

_Yeah?_

_We'll be going outside of it_.

_Guess this is goodbye, then_, Ino thought.

With a flash, Ino was gone, and Shino's body returned to his control. Quietly, he smiled beneath his jacket collar.

_I talked to her._

Stopping at a tree branch not far from the ground, Kiba shook Shino.

"You back?" he asked.

"...what? Yes," said Shino. "However, I may need you to keep me upright for a little while longer. Hinata, was it strictly necessary to-...Hinata?"

She was on the opposite side of the branch.

"What?" asked Kiba.

She looked back, eyes glowing with the Byakugan.

"...h-hold Shino for a second," she said, and jumped down from the branch.

Quickly heading after her, Kiba and Shino landed near where she had, at the roots of the tree. She was staring at the trunk with an expression of surprise and wonder, though Shino and Kiba couldn't see anything particularly different about this one tree.

"What is it?" asked Kiba.

"Th-there's something on this tree," she said. "A symbol."

"What?" asked Kiba.

"I th-think it's only visible under the Byakugan," said Hinata. "I've seen it before, in Hisui. It was in my room. On my bed, on the bunk above mine, there was...a circle, with a lot of smaller circles inside of it. They overlapped with one another to m-make a pattern. It looked like flowers. Then, when I looked at it with the Byakugan, there was a painting over it, a painting of a sun, a leaf, a snowflake, and a flower. In the middle of all of them was a person with four arms reaching out to them all, but no face. N-now I can see it, there, only now it's glowing."

"...that's probably important," Kiba said.

"Why?" asked Shino.

"Well, I don't know about you," said Kiba, "but most graffiti I see is more like "Ando/Naomi 4-Eva" than 'guy with four arms and no face'. Whoever painted it, they must've been 'round Konoha _and_ Hisui."

"Makes enough sense," said Shino. "The village and Hisui were trading partners. Do you think it has something to do with the jade clones?"

"No," said Hinata. "Th-this is older. I think the one on my bunk was as well."

She raised her hand and formed a thin beam of chakra from her palm. Then, carefully, she stabbed the glowing symbol with the beam.

The earth beneath her suddenly seemed to give way, and she jumped back, away from the roots as they all sank a little. Some sank more than others, however, and eventually it dawned on her what was happening: the roots were forming a set of stairs.

"Cool," said Kiba.

"Yes," said Shino, "quite an impressive piece of chakra-work. But what does it mean?"

"Means there's something down there," said Kiba.

The two of them looked to Hinata for guidance.

"W-well..." said Hinata. "We have a while before we have to get to the centre of the forest..."

She went over to the stairs and leant down, peering into the dark below. Kiba chuckled as he joined her, holding Shino upright.

"See, Hinata?" said Kiba. "You _have_ to be brave. Your immediate plan when you see a mysterious staircase made of roots is 'look inside'."

Hinata smiled.

"R-right now I'm feeling more curious than brave," she said.

"Alright," said Kiba. "Let's take a look. But first, Shino, throw a bug down there, will you?"

Shino nodded, and raised a hand to send a kikai down. Once it returned, he pulled it back into himself and spoke.

"It seems fine," he said. "There's room enough to walk in there. You can put me down, now."

Complying, Kiba let Shino go. The Aburame then walked down the stairs. Hinata followed, Byakugan still on, and Kiba was last, holding Akamaru to stop the little dog from bolting.

"It's dark," said Kiba.

"Yes," said Shino. "Wait."

Shino concentrated, and kikai flowed around his hand, circling it. Slowly, they began to glow, and the room was lit up. They were in some kind of long hallway.

"I-it's mostly earth around us," said Hinata, turning off the Byakugan.

They began to walk.

"So is this still part of the exams, do you think?" asked Kiba.

"I d-don't think so," said Hinata. "You two couldn't see that sign, and there's only one other Hyuga here, r-remember?"

"Right," said Kiba. "So, Shino, any particular reason you were smiling after Ino stopped possessing you back there?"

Shino knew that he was probably beyond the stage of plausible deniability, but he elected to attempt it nonetheless.

"...no," he said.

"You should t-tell him, Shino," said Hinata. "Being nervous and shy is my job."

"Hrrm," said Shino.

_I suppose I can't reasonably lie anymore_, he thought.

"I...ah..." he began.

He didn't want to say 'like'. 'Like' sounded juvenile, _pointless_.

"...am _attracted_ to...Ino," he finished.

"Okay," said Kiba.

Leaning towards Shino, he whispered:

"Good waist-hip ratio?"

"What?" asked Hinata, looking back at them.

Shino and Kiba looked at her nervously.

"Nothing," they said.

Leaning away from Shino, Kiba continued:

"Anyway, while we're still on stuff you guys don't know, I was almost arranged to be married to her."

"I know," said Shino. "She told me when she possessed me."

"Huh," said Kiba. "Well, don't worry about it, man. She's all yours."

Shino shook his head.

"Not unless Sasuke happens to disap-"

They had come to the end of the hall, where it opened up into a small chamber. The room's walls were straight in the half that joined with the hall, but round in the other end, where a triangular obelisk was surrounded by three coffins. Everything was made in stone, and their footsteps echoed across the room as they stopped to stare at it.

"-pear," Shino finished.

Immediately, Hinata and Kiba started ahead.

"Wait!" said Shino.

They both stopped and turned to look at the Aburame, who said:

"Don't...breathe."

Kiba stared at him.

"You want us to try photosynthesis?" he asked.

"If this place is as old as I think it is, the air could be poisonous or stale," said Shino. "We should go outside again, then wait for the air to clear out."

Kiba sniffed deeply.

"Seems fine to me," he said. "Akamaru?"

Akamaru nodded to him.

"Strange," said Shino.

Kiba shrugged.

"Maybe it's got ventilation shafts," he said.

Hinata suddenly shrieked, the sound echoing through the chamber, and the boys spun around in case something had appeared. Nothing seemed to be there, but Hinata had the Byakugan on again, and looked frightened.

"What?" said Kiba.

"Th-the walls..." she said, "...behind the walls, it's not just earth. There are bodies."

Shino looked over to the three coffins, then at the walls, then realised where they were.

"A sacrifice pit," he said.

There ensued an awkward silence.

"...Sh-shino," said Hinata, turning off the Byakugan, "I don't th-think you should sound that excited when you say something like 'sacrifice pit'."

Shino looked shamefaced.

"...sorry," he said.

Looking around, Shino explained himself.

"This tomb must be even older than I thought," he said. "Human sacrifice hasn't been a part of most religions in centuries."

"Most?" asked Kiba, looking at the coffins.

"No doubt there are some who still practice it," said Shino. "There's a cult that worships a god called Jashin-"

A loud shudder rumbled across the tomb, shaking the dust from the tops of the coffins.

Then another.

"Come on!" Kiba shouted, and they ran.

Doubling back to the hall, Shino, Kiba and Hinata skidded to a halt as they saw the ceiling crack, and all three of them stepped back as far as they could before it fell. Careful to avoid making more cracks, the genin went back to the chamber, ever-cautious.

"Perfect," said Kiba.

"Don't worry," said Shino.

"I'm not worrying."

"Good. If the air isn't stale, then there must be ventilation shafts, like you said."

"I was kidding," said Kiba. "I mean, it's a tomb."

Experimentally, Hinata put her fingers together in a sign and said '_Byakugan_'.

"I don't know about you," Kiba continued, "but I'm pretty sure corpses don't need air."

Looking out behind the walls, Hinata realised what the corpses were.

"They're mummies," she said.

Kiba and Shino turned to look at her.

"Th-the bodies in the earth," said Hinata. "They look kind of like the jade clones from Hisui, but more...old-fashioned? Th-they're mummies, anyway."

"Isn't mummification for preserving people?" asked Kiba.

"Y-yes," said Hinata.

"I thought you didn't know about tombs and such," said Shino.

"Nah, not much," said Kiba. "But mummies are cool. So, why would someone just bury a bunch of mummies underground, without even coffins?"

"I don't know," said Shino. "I've never heard of human sacrifice victims being mummified, that doesn't make any sense..."

Glancing around the tomb, Kiba shook his head.

"This is some serious Okachisai crap," he said.

He looked to Hinata.

"What now, fearless leader?" he asked.

"I-I'm the leader?" she asked, incredulous.

"Yes?" said Shino.

Hinata looked confused.

"Wh-why me?"

"Neither of us are suited for the job," said Shino. "You are skilled at tactics and reconnaissance, as well as stealth."

"Yeah, you are pretty good at sneaking around sometimes," said Kiba.

"B-but you two are good at things as well," Hinata protested. "That doesn't mean I should be the leader."

"We have our skills, but you are inevitably the decision-maker," said Shino. "Besides, I work best in an advisory capacity."

"And I'm a devil-may-care shinobi on the edge who doesn't play by the rules," said Kiba.

Hinata raised her eyebrows at him.

"You see?" Kiba said. "You're the hero, and we're your sidekicks."

"N-no I'm not," said Hinata.

"Yeah you are," said Kiba, "you have to be. Mom gone, evil dad, you have special powers-"

"I _d-don't_ have 'special powers'," Hinata said.

"You opened this tomb," said Shino.

"Tomb-opening?" asked Hinata. "I'm g-going to fight evil with tomb-opening? B-besides, Kiba, you have special powers and _your_ d-dad is evil. And you're the last male Inuzuka."

Kiba shook his head.

"No," he said. "My dad's more a jerk than actually evil. Besides, you're a princess."

"What?" asked Shino.

"N-no I'm not," said Hinata. "Y-your mom said my mother's country is gone now, Kiba. Besides, I don't want to be like those girls that obsess over how th-they're related to the Daimyo or s-something."

"So..." said Shino. "Technically, you're an _exiled_ princess..."

"Hey, yeah," said Kiba, "and good princesses are _always_ exiled ones."

"D-don't encourage him," said Hinata. "M-my life isn't a fairytale."

"Alright," said Kiba, "sorry. But you're the leader."

Hinata shrugged.

"I-if you say so," she said.

Leaving them, Hinata went over to the three coffins around the obelisk.

"Anything?" asked Shino.

"Th-there are three mummies in the coffins, but I c-can't see through this rock," she answered.

"I thought the Byakugan could see through anything," said Kiba.

"There are some materials that stop it," said Hinata. "The Hyuga compound is partly built out of them."

Kiba nodded, wandering over to the curved walls. Feeling them, he noticed that not only were they also rock, but they seemed to have a particular pattern on them: curved lines that went up as they circled around the walls, like long snakes. Turning away, he put his hand back on Akamaru to steady the dog and spoke again.

"You said you could see through the walls in the hallway, right?" he asked Hinata.

"Y-yes," said Hinata.

He walked over to the straight walls.

"Then they can't be that strong," he said. "Maybe Akamaru and I could use Fang over Fang and tunnel through-...wait just a second."

Turning around, he went back to the curved wall and felt the pattern again.

"You see this pattern on the wall?" he asked.

"Yes?" said Shino.

Kiba looked away from the wall, leaning on it.

"Back when I first got Akamaru, him and I practiced Fang over Fang on a hill," he said.

"Why on a hill?" Hinata asked.

"'Cos my mom complained about structural damage if we did it on the house," said Kiba. "Anyway, I must've looked at that hill every single time after I did Fang over Fang, and the soil got messed up in a very specific way."

"Like a screw?" asked Shino.

"Exactly," said Kiba. "I think this bit with the coffins is a giant screw."

"Hrm," mused Shino, looking from the coffins to the wall. "The wall seems to be made of the same material as the screw, so I'm assuming it wasn't made for drilling."

Thinking about the roots that became stairs, Hinata had a brainwave.

"M-maybe it's an elevator?" she suggested.

"Right," said Kiba, "yeah, that could be it. You can make screw elevators, right?"

"They would be mechanically inefficient," said Shino, "but they are quite possible. However, an elevator to where? The way up is blocked."

"Who knows?" asked Kiba. "Maybe there's a whole network of tombs like this, below the Forest of Death."

Shino rubbed at his chin, and wished he was old enough to have a beard to stroke.

"Perhaps," he said. "It seems there are two options before us: Kiba drills our way out in the hallway, or we take the screw-elevator. Out of intellectual curiosity, I favour the second."

"I w-want to know what's going on here, too," said Hinata.

"I'm game," said Kiba. "Besides, not keen on Fang-over-Fang-ing through a bunch of mummies."

The three children stepped onto the screw-elevator, each in front of a coffin.

"What do we do?" asked Kiba.

"There are engravings on the stone in front of the three coffins," said Shino.

Leaning down to see them, Hinata said:

"Th-that's the symbol I saw on the tree."

"Hey, neat," said Kiba, wiping dust from his as he held a wriggling Akamaru in the other hand. "Whoever made this place, they sure liked four-armed no-face guy. Do we have to use Gentle Fist on 'em?"

"I don't think so," Hinata said. "J-just focus your chakra in your hand."

"Yeah," said Kiba, "but even if it works, what if it sucks our souls out or something?"

"Unlikely," Shino said. "This would be for the priests. It's too small-scale to bring people down for mass burial."

There was silence as Hinata and Kiba looked at him nervously.

"Uh..." said Kiba. "...this is good to know _now_, Shino, but when you talk to Ino, try not to mention how much you know about human sacrifice. You'll only get _reaaally_ freaky chicks that way."

"Duly noted," said Shino, putting his hand on the engraving.

As Hinata and Kiba did the same, he said:

"Focus chakra on the count of three?"

"Mm-hmm," said Hinata.

"One. Two. Three."

They focused, and the engravings glowed bright white as the screw began to turn, bringing them down at first slowly, then growing faster and faster, pulling the squad down deep into the earth.

00000

Some time later, the screw-elevator slowed down, coming to a stop at the end of a hallway.

Blinking and staggering a little, Kiba asked:

"Is anyone else kind of dizzy?"

"Yes," said Shino, trying not to feel so ill. "That would seem to be the downside of an elevator made out of a giant screw."

Stumbling off the screw, the children kept to the walls of the hallway, Shino making his kikai glow again. Walking up the hallway, which was on a slight uphill slope, they eventually came to two massive, open doors that lead into a huge chamber, four or so times bigger than the first.

The chamber was not square like the previous one, but triangular, with six massive obelisks to the left and right of a single dais. On top of the dais was a box made of stone, in the shape of a pyramid, and jet black. There were doors on the other two walls of the chamber, and from the one to the left came noise and a little light.

"Hide," whispered Kiba.

Quickly, they all stepped behind one of the giant open doors, peering in through the crack. Shino darkened his kikai as Hinata turned on the Byakugan and watched three people enter. Two were Hyuga, wearing clean, expensive-looking white robes and apparently not wearing Konoha headbands. From their distancing of themselves from the village and their wealth, Hinata knew they were some of the richer clan members, although she'd never actually met them before. The third man was a mystery to her, with short brown hair and a deep scar. He wore no headband.

"Here," said the man.

The two Hyuga beside him nodded, and all three of them did hand-signs before the pyramid-shaped dais. The black stone suddenly lit up, revealing symbols like a TV screen.

"This will lead us to the Knife?" asked one Hyuga.

The man chuckled.

"That's the plan," he said.

Walking over to the dais, the man pushed a button. On the floor, around the feet of the two Hyuga, two circles of light appeared.

"What are these circles?" asked the other Hyuga.

"Nothing," said the man. "It's mostly superstitious crap anyw-"

The two Hyuga had stepped out of their circles and hit him with Gentle Fist, sending him to fall onto the hard stone floor. Standing over him, they surrounded him as they stood in front of the dais.

"Do you take us for fools?" asked the second Hyuga. "Lord Hideki will not pay you in full unless we return alive."

"Hey, come on," said the man, raising his hands in protest as he stood up. "I don't know what every goddamn thing in here does."

He gestured at a button.

"Like, see this?" he said.

"Don't push tha-" began the Hyuga, but he was interrupted by the man pushing it.

The two Hyuga winced, but nothing changed, and slowly both relaxed.

"See?" said the man. "Nothing."

Now flanked by the two Hyuga, the man gestured to various parts of the dais.

"Alright," he said. "You two use Gentle Fist here and here, and I push this."

The Hyuga to the right of the man put his left hand on one of the sides of the pyramid-dais, and the Hyuga to the left put his right hand on the opposite side. The man put his fingers close to the dais, and counted down.

"One, two, _three_," he said.

The two Hyuga both pushed into the pyramid with Gentle Fist, but the man stepped backwards as they did so, not pushing the button.

"What're you-" began one of the Hyuga, but the man just shook his head and said:

"You _really_ shouldn't've gone outside the circles."

There was a roaring sound and a bright red light from the dais, which suddenly arced out from the pyramid and shocked both the Hyuga, sending so much chakra into them that their chakra-networks were visible to the naked eye. Screaming in pain, both tried to take their hands off of the machine, but they were trapped there until their screams finally stopped, and both were gently pushed to the ground by the man, dead. The dais glowed bright from this, until eventually, slowly, it dimmed.

Then appeared a great projection in the middle of the air, a globe, which the man watched from a circle of his own. Pointing to certain parts of the globe, the man seemed to take notes onto a scroll, which he then rolled up and sealed. Pocketing the scroll as he stepped off the circle, the globe disappeared, and he began to leave.

Hinata suddenly became aware that Kiba had moved from the back of the door, and he had stepped into the light of the room, staring at the man.

"Dad?" he said.

There was a second of absolute stillness.

Then, with a speed that Hinata had never seen before, Ashinoura ran out of the chamber and down towards the hall he had entered into. Kiba ran after him, and Shino and Hinata scrambled after Kiba, passing by the door and running after their squadmate.

Around the corner, they found him watching as Ashinoura rose upwards in one of the elevators, his face unreadable as Kiba watched him go.

"Dammit!" Kiba shouted.

Swiftly turning around, he began to walk back up the hallway, Hinata and Shino following.

"There's gotta be a way to go after him," he said.

"How?" asked Shino. "We don't know how the elevators work, and if we get it wrong-"

"We can figure it out," said Kiba, "if we just hurry-"

"K-kiba, he's _gone_," said Hinata.

"No," said Kiba, passing through the doorway, "not yet. Even if we don't get him, they'll be looking for him in the Forest. They'll get him. They'll..."

He looked upon the bodies of the dead Hyuga, and the fire seemed to go out of him.

"Dad," he said. "Son of...s-son of a bitch."

He thought at that moment that he was going to fall to his knees, but he didn't. Because then, of all times, Hinata and Shino both drew close and stopped him from falling, holding him up by the arms as he stood there.

As they let go, Kiba looked at Shino, amazed.

"You said you don't like hugs," he said.

"Yes," said Shino, "but you didn't."

Kiba couldn't keep eye contact any longer, and closed his eyes for some time.

Clearing his throat, Shino spoke again.

"Are you certain that was your father?" he asked.

"Yeah," said Kiba, eyes open again. "I didn't know for sure until I got a good look at his face, but it was definitely him. What the hell was he doing here?"

"Some kind of deal between your father and a 'Lord Hideki'," said Shino. "Judging by the involvement of Hyuga and the fact that his name starts with an H, I assume he belongs to your clan, Hinata?"

"Y-yes," said Hinata. "Hideki is..."

She thought about how to explain it.

"...k-kind of old fashioned. He thinks the Hyuga are better than everyone else."

"Doesn't almost every Hyuga think that?" asked Kiba.

"Y-yes, but not like this," said Hinata. "H-he thinks Hyuga are...superior. Maybe even divine."

Shino nodded.

"I know of such a kind," he said, darkly. "He must have sent Ashinoura and the other Hyuga down here, looking for-"

There was a flash of light as Kiba stepped onto Ashinoura's circle by accident, and the globe appeared again.

"-a map," Shino finished.

Taking paper out of his pocket, Shino began to copy the map down as the three of them stared at it, Hinata keeping watch with the Byakugan.

"What is that?" asked Kiba. "Some kind of illusion jutsu?"

"Yes, but one that the seer is aware is fake," said Shino. "A primitive alternative to a monitor."

"H-how come the continents are wrong?" asked Hinata. "It is a map, isn't it?"

"It's a map," said Shino. "And my guess would be continental drift."

From his circle, Kiba raised a hand.

"C'mon," he said, "continental drift? This place can't be that old."

"Evidently it is," said Shino.

Kiba shook his head.

"I don't know," he said.

"There're markings in some places," said Hinata, pointing to them. "They kind of look like the four-armed man."

"Yes," said Shino, watching them as they slowly circled past. "They may be images of idols, or actual writing. In ancient times, writing was far more complicated than it is now. Pictures for words, no kana...the four-armed man is common enough in all of this that it must symbolise something other than its literal meaning."

"Maybe," said Kiba, "but it could still be literal. Maybe they had a god with four arms? I mean, sacrifice pit and all."

"Unlikely," said Shino. "This many sacrifices were only usually for when a king or queen was buried. How many mummies would you say you saw outside, Hinata?"

Hinata thought back.

"A lot," she said.

"Most likely too many for sacrifices to a simple temple," said Shino. "Whatever this place is, those who built it were far in advance compared to other civilisations of their time."

"Waaay in advance, if we can barely recognise a map of the world from their time," said Kiba.

"Th-they mentioned something about a knife," said Hinata. "B-but the map has more than one place highlighted on it."

"This knife could be in pieces," said Shino.

"Really?" asked Kiba. "How many pieces can a knife be in? It's probably a codeword for something else."

Hinata suddenly heard a rustling sound, and looked frantically around the room. It was empty, as were the hallways, save for the three genin, but she was still certain she heard something.

"S-someone's here," she said, watching the shadows nervously.

Kiba turned around in his circle.

"Where?" he asked her. "Is it my dad?"

"I...I d-don't know," she said.

"Can't you see 'em with the Byakugan?" asked Kiba.

"...no," she said.

Shino turned away from the map to stare at her.

"There aren't ways to fool the Byakugan, are there?" he asked. "Jutsu?"

"N-_no_," said Hinata. "That's what bothers me."

Kiba shrugged.

"Hey," he said, "maybe it was your imagina-"

The rustling noise happened again, and this time all three of them heard it.

"...we should go," said Shino.

Agreeing wholeheartedly, Kiba stepped off the circle as Shino put his scroll away, making the globe disappear again. They looked at either hallway.

"Which one?" asked Kiba.

"The o-one we came in with has a blocked passageway," said Hinata. "And y-your dad's probably won't work anymore."

Their eyes all went to the third hallway.

"Alright," said Kiba, "let's go."

At the end of the final hallway, they found another screw-elevator, and all quickly boarded it, putting their hands on the obelisk's engravings. As she stood there, next to Kiba and Shino, Hinata realised the Byakugan was still on, and went to deactivate it.

Then, for the briefest of seconds, she saw someone in the room. She couldn't tell who it was, or what they properly looked like, but their chakra network appeared for the scarcest of moments before disappearing again, now invisible to her.

00000

Notes:

(1) Namahage: Japanese equivalent of the bogeyman.

(2) Kiba-niisan: 'Big brother Kiba'.

00000

Well, merry Hastmaanzastivolstice.


	10. A Successful Match

Hi, everyone. Against all odds, I have taken slightly less than a year to update this (last time was Christmas Eve of 2011). I hope you all enjoy this very chapter, very long in production.

**Warning:** It's occurred to me that this chapter might be disturbing to some people, since it depicts prejudice against someone for their sexuality. Also, there's minor blood and other such injuries, but I don't think there's anything else you wouldn't see in canonical _Naruto_.

00000

_Chapter 10: A Successful Match_

Hiashi stood in a room that was near empty, and wondered how Hinata had survived in such a blank place. The bed covers were white, as were the walls and door. Nothing sat on the shelves save for an old-kunai box, and the single desk that Hinata had was a medium brown. There was only one window, and the view from it was not particularly inspiring, but he could tell from where the desk was placed that Hinata must have looked out of it a great deal. It was perhaps no wonder that other members of the clan complained to him about her 'undisciplined spirit' and constant wandering the village. In contrast, given how lavishly their quarters were decorated, he doubted they could live in a room like Hinata's for very long.

Turning away from the window, Hiashi's eyes passed the kunai box on the shelf, and noticed a sliver of paper poking out from the box's lid. Suspicious, he walked over to the shelf and opened the box. Save for the single piece of paper, it was empty.

He picked up the paper and read it.

_Who has told of the ancient days, where the silent creatures of the perilous dark came so close to ending the fires of life itself? _the paper read. _Who has heard of those who walked among the shadows, the hidden weapons of mankind? Few, now, if ever. But far beyond now, in the ancient days, a lone shinobi battled such evil. His name: Okachisai._

Hiashi stared confusedly at this bizarre paragraph, but got no further than that as he heard footsteps from the hall growing louder. Stuffing the paper into his pocket, he left Hinata's room quickly, shutting the door behind him as two Hyuga approached.

A tall man accompanied a girl that looked a little older than Hinata; Hiashi guessed she was Hoshi. Neither were wearing the Konoha headband, an act that Hiashi had deemed an offence for active ninja, but that was not important now. Whatever had happened between Hoshi, her friend Hiroko, Hinata and (apparently) Naruto Uzumaki, it had given Hinata the power of Gentle Fist. If Hiashi's theory was correct, Hoshi and Hiroko had severely emotionally affected Hinata. The question was how.

The man spoke first.

"Lady Hoshi informed me you wished to speak with her, Lord Hiashi."

Hiashi sized him up – a muscular man, with hair that only reached his shoulders. Three kunai hung on the side of his belt; this was unusual for a Hyuga, who mostly disdained those who openly displayed weapons. Judging by his thick arms and the belt's faded but not heavily scratched nature, he was someone who fought a great deal, but in terms of sparring rather than in real confrontations. A taijutsu instructor.

"You are...Hotaka, yes?" Hiashi said.

"That is correct, Lord Hiashi," Hotaka said, bowing slightly. "I attempted to instruct your daughter in Gentle Fist for some time."

"She appears to have learned on her own," noted Hiashi, which caused a twinge of annoyance in Hotaka.

Hiashi looked to the so-far silent Hoshi, who was more or less standing up straight, though she was fidgeting, feeling around her left hand's fingertips with her thumb. An unpleasant wave of bad memories returned to him as he watched her fidget. A perfect Hyuga (and his father's mantra was basically 'all Hyuga must be perfect') was meant to be able to stand perfectly still for as long as need be, a skill that required years of practice. The fact that Hoshi couldn't manage this, even if she was part of an ultra pro-Hyuga crowd, meant that there was still some ordinary human being left in her.

"You witnessed Hinata using Gentle Fist, didn't you, Hoshi?" Hiashi asked.

Hoshi spoke, with an accidental touch of the dramatic.

"She threatened me, Lord Hiashi. And Hiroko. And Naruto Uzumaki did as well."

Hiashi was unaware of if Naruto Uzumaki was the type to threaten anyone, but he was fairly certain Hinata wasn't.

"Why would my daughter threaten you?" he asked. "She is not known for her confrontational nature."

"She's in with a bad crowd," declared Hoshi.

_She is not alone in that regard_, thought Hiashi, fighting the urge to glance meaningfully at Hotaka for Hoshi's benefit.

"That Inuzuka, and the Aburame, and Naruto," Hoshi continued. "Why else would she leave the clan?"

Hotaka nodded in what he obviously considered a sage manner.

"Your daughter always lacked any element of self-control, Lord Hiashi," he said. "She never successfully performed a kata to the standards of the other children her age, regardless of how long I had her drill it."

Hiashi resisted frowning, mustered his not inconsiderable reserves of contempt, then densely packed them into a single syllable.

"Oh?" he said, raising an eyebrow.

Hotaka was perceptive enough to fall silent, but Hoshi spoke again.

"I'm sorry, Lord Hiashi," she said, "but Hinata doesn't have much poise. She was crying, and loudly, when she threatened us."

Hiashi considered this.

_Good_, he thought.

"Thankyou, Hoshi," he said. "This has been informative."

Bowing slightly, he turned away. Waiting until he was a few paces from the two of them, he then turned back and spoke again.

"And you are correct," he said, looking straight into Hoshi's eyes.

He flicked his eyes right, from the short girl to Hotaka beside her, and held his gaze even as the instructor narrowed his eyes in quiet anger.

"Controlling oneself is vital," said Hiashi.

With another quick glance at Hoshi, who seemed to look a little puzzled at what Hiashi had just said, he turned and left them completely.

The plan was developing nicely.

00000

The three genin stood nervously in front of the guard chunin as he went over their Scrolls of Heaven and Earth. Hinata, conscious of the fact that she probably poked her fingers together too much for her own good, had stuck her hands in her pockets and was rocking back and forth on her feet. Kiba stood sideways to the others, sniffing a little to check if any other squad was forthcoming. Akamaru sat on the boy's head, ears pricked slightly. Shino was perfectly still and calm-looking, although an observant ninja might notice that a dragonfly near him was repeatedly flying in a perfect equilateral triangle.

Eventually, the guard nin gave the papers back.

"Is everything in order?" asked Shino.

"Yeah, these're real," said the guard nin. "You got here pretty quick. You guys're only the second team to arrive."

Shino's outward expression did not change, but his unwitting control over the dragonfly disappeared, and it went back to doing whatever dragonflies usually did. The three children nodded thanks to the guard, then walked past him as the entered the building.

"That can't be good," said Shino, last to enter, closing the door behind him.

"What?" asked Kiba. "That we only came second?"

Prompted by a sign saying "Chunin Exams Waiting Room This Way", they all turned a corner, the soles of their sandals tapping the wood-panelled floor of the hallway.

"That we did so well in the first place," said Shino.

"Wh-why?" Hinata said. "Reconnaissance squads are meant to be fast."

"I don't think we're that proficient," said Shino. "Do you remember how long we took to get to Kurenai's test in the forest? Our sloth in that case would imply that our speed in finishing this test is unusual."

"M-maybe we've gotten a lot better since then," said Hinata.

It felt like years since she'd first met Shino and Kiba, and her time in school was already a distant memory.

Shino began to speak again.

"Possibl-"

All three stopped abruptly as they came across a very tall boy, dressed entirely in black and wearing purple facepaint in an intricate design. Behind him was the door to the waiting room, through which they could see the rest of the boy's squad.

"S-sorry," said Hinata, bowing a little.

Awkwardly stepping past, the three of them walked through the door, stealing glances at the other two genin as they passed. One was a blonde girl with large pigtails, the other a red-haired boy with a tattoo on his forehead and a lack of eyebrows. Remembering Naruto's warning about that boy, Hinata gestured for the other two to follow her, and they sat on the opposite side of the fairly large room.

Leaning up against the wall, all three tried not to look at either genin.

Hinata looked to Kiba, who put Akamaru in his lap and began patting him.

"Are you okay?" she whispered.

Kiba said nothing, only looking down slightly.

Hinata nodded.

Shino, apparently from nowhere, pulled out a piece of paper and a pen, and held it out to Kiba.

Kiba and Hinata stared at him.

"...you're kidding," Kiba said.

Shino leaned down, wrote something on the paper, then handed it and the pen to Kiba.

_No._ it read, in Shino's handwriting.

Gesturing to Kiba, Hinata took the paper and wrote, then passed it back to Kiba again.

**Kiba, are you okay?** she wrote.** We didn't get a chance to talk on the way here.**

Kiba thought on this, then wrote on the paper below what she and Shino had done. Once finished, Shino and Hinata leaned over and read it.

I never expected Ashinoura to come back., Kiba's section read.  It's not just that he's joined up with the Hyuga, it's that he's here at all.

_The presence of Jade Clones both here and at Hisui suggests some kind of connection to Gishiki as well._, wrote Shino. _Hinata, if you know, what happened to your mother?_

**I don't know. My father never told me about her, and I'm too young to remember much.**

Kiba grunted at this, then wrote:

Bastard'd keep you in the dark for anything.

_Possibly, although he may find it difficult to discuss. She was his wife._

Yeah., Kiba wrote. Mom doesn't talk about dad much.

**What do you think that thing from the tomb was?** asked Hinata.

Something that can't be seen by the Byakugan and can't be tracked even with a nose like mine or Akamaru's. Ring any bells?

**Whatever killed Naruto's father?**

Seems like it.

Thinking deeply, Shino stuck the end of the pen in his mouth.

"Eww," said Kiba, very quietly.

"It's my pen," protested Shino.

Kiba shook his head in disgust, and Shino put the pen away. He then brought out another one, and wrote on the paper again.

_There's something deeper here. It's worth looking into_.

**By ourselves?** wrote Hinata, sceptical.

_Yes._ _Pragmatically speaking, the involvement of your clan and Kiba's father mean it will be unlikely the village will believe us._

Not to mention Jade Clones, long-dead civilisations, human sacrifice and people talking about a 'knife'.

Hinata sighed as she read this. It seemed strange, how elaborately life chose to make things difficult.

We should ask Neji., Kiba wrote.

Hinata considered how to respond to this for a full minute, until eventually she simply wrote:

**Why?**

Neji's part of the Hyuga, so he should be able to open the tomb like you did. If we can get him to help us, we'll be able to prove it's not just to damage the Hyuga and my dad. I know he doesn't like you, Hinata, but maybe we can convince him.

Breathing in deeply, Hinata prepared to tell them the truth. It would have inevitably come up some day, but she'd hoped there'd be more time.

**That's not going to work.**, she wrote.

_Why not?_

**He's a member of the Hyuga clan Branch House.**

Kiba ruminated on this for a moment.

How can he be in a branch house if he's your dad's nephew? he wrote.

**It's because of how our fathers were born. My father was born first, so he was chosen as heir to the clan. Neji's father was put in the Branch House, along with his son. That's why he hates me.**

Kiba's response made Hinata relieved and even more tense, all at once.

They put curse marks on Hyuga Branch House members, don't they? it read.

Slowly, Hinata nodded.

A silence then lasted for a long time, and Hinata couldn't bring herself to look at either boy. She didn't want to see the faces of friends who'd trusted her, who thought she was _kind_, finding out the worst part of the Hyuga clan.

"Let's go," said Kiba.

"Wh-where?"

"We're a recon squad," he said, standing up. "Let's reconnoitre."

Still sitting, Shino looked up at Kiba and raised his eyebrows.

"'Reconnoitre'?" he said.

Kiba smiled, clutching Akamaru.

"Been reading my calendar."

Shino stood as well, and they both looked expectantly at Hinata. She looked back, cautiously, uncertain of their reaction.

"...what?" asked Shino.

Hinata smiled slightly, and she stood up by her friends. Together, they left the room.

Outside, in the hallway, was a huge window. The three children sat on the window's edge, backs to the glass, watching as the light from outside made rippling shadows on the wall in front of them.

Eventually, Hinata spoke again.

"How do you know about the Branch House?" she asked.

"My mom," Kiba said. "Remember, Hyuga and Inuzuka used to be allies; we have connections like that. They're kind of everywhere in the village anyway, though."

"Hmm," said Hinata, cursing herself for never noticing.

"What happened to Neji's father?" asked Shino.

Kiba almost winced as Shino said this.

"Shino..." he began, but Hinata held up a hand.

"I-it's okay," she said. "You should both know everything."

She put both hands by her side to steady herself, and began to explain.

"...when I was about four, men came from the Land of Lightning," she said. "They traded with my father, but then they tried to kidnap me. F-for the Byakugan. My father killed the ninja who took me. They said they didn't kidnap me, and demanded my father die for what he did."

"When you were _four_?" asked Kiba. "Who the hell kidnaps a four year old?"

"And why would they demand your father die?" asked Shino. "Is that legal?"

"Hyuga try to solve things by their laws," said Hinata. "N-not the village's. A-anyway, my father had to die, even though he was head of the clan."

She swallowed back a lump in her throat, then continued.

"Neji's father was my father's twin, and Branch House members have a seal on their head that removes the Byakugan when they die. I-it causes pain as well...we use that to control them. They took Neji's father instead of mine and killed him. Th-they must have known it wasn't my father once he died and they lost the Byakugan, but there was nothing they could do."

Not bothering to wipe the rapidly-forming tears from her eyes, Hinata finished:

"S-so we won. M-my father lived, and Neji lost the only parent he had because they wanted me."

The two boys considered this.

"We got all the luck, don't we?" said Kiba.

Hinata laughed and sobbed at the same time, wiping her eyes with her sleeve.

"Hinata," said Shino. "Don't think that you were the cause of this."

"I know," she said, reaching up to scratch the back of her head. "I-I haven't dealt with it very well, though."

"You haven't dealt with it well?" said Kiba. "Well, that's unacceptable, Hinata. You should've beaten up eight highly trained ninja at once when you were four, I should've punched my dad in the face until he stopped running, and Shino should've held the guys who trained him by the kikai 'til they left him the hell alone."

Hinata laughed, properly this time, and blew her nose on a tissue she'd found in her pocket.

Shino looked thoughtful.

"I actually did control my tutors' kikai once," he said, almost wistfully. "I didn't hold them up in the air or anything, but I pushed back against one of my tutors when I got angry."

Kiba smiled.

"Really?" he said.

"I was put in confinement for the rest of the day," said Shino.

Hinata laughed again.

"You rebel," said Kiba.

"Yes," agreed Shino. "I am veritably the bad boy of the Aburame clan."

"Y-you've done more than I have," Hinata said.

"C'mon, Hinata," said Kiba. "You can't've been all 'do what the clan says'."

Hinata shrugged.

"I used to hoard stuff in my old room," she admitted. "S-so the clan couldn't find out."

"Like what?" asked Kiba.

"Clippings from _Real Ninja Stories_," said Hinata. "Things I'd found while I was out in the village. And..."

Involuntarily, her fingers came together and pushed themselves as she avoided directly looking at either of her squadmates.

"...um..." she said, a blush forming.

"What?" asked Shino.

"…a little while ago, before we left for Hisui, N-naruto gave me his goggles," Hinata said. "They're probably still under my mattress."

"Your mattress?" asked Shino, as if this was a historical curiosity rather than the most embarrassing thing Hinata had ever admitted to anyone.

Kiba smirked.

"You sure they're not under your pillow, Hinata?" he asked.

Hinata blushed furiously.

"I h-hate both of you," she said.

Akamaru wandered away from Kiba's lap, passed over Shino's, and ended up on Hinata's, sniffing at her and whining a little.

"N-not you, Akamaru, you're nice."

Picking him up, she rubbed his belly, smiling at him.

"Y-you're a good boy, aren't you?" said Hinata.

A chunin walked past, and Hinata suddenly stopped patting Akamaru, handing him back to Kiba. She hoped her face wasn't red now. If she was going to be taken seriously as a kunoichi, she couldn't act so childish in public.

Once the chunin left, Hinata pushed herself down from the windowsill, and smiled at Kiba and Shino as they followed suit.

"T-thankyou," she said to both of them.

Pushing his hood down and putting the small dog on his shoulders, Kiba shook his head.

"You never have to thank us, _imouto_," he said, and Shino nodded in agreement.

Hinata looked behind her, to the door to the room.

"We should head back," she said.

00000

After another hour or so of waiting, a ninja who persistently coughed every few sentences came along and told the two squads to follow him to the next stage of the exam. This was a much bigger place, with audience stands on either side of a fighting arena and a large statue of a Buddha in the middle. Even then, it was still just Squad Eight and the squad from Sunagakure. Following the established routine, the squads stood on the opposite sides of the room, each in the stands to the sides of the fighting arena.

Eventually, another squad from Konoha came, but to Hinata's misfortune it was Neji's. The squadmates of Neji seemed nice enough, with the boy in a green jumpsuit waving enthusiastically to everyone, but no amount of cajoling on his part could get Neji to stand anywhere near Hinata. Eventually giving up, the jumpsuit boy loudly declared that everybody present was a splendid ninja, and started doing stomach crunches in the far corner of the Konoha stand. Kiba looked like he was considering speaking to the girl in the squad, but then she started sharpening an apparently endless supply of kunai, and that discouraged him.

Shino stood, leaning on the railing of the stand, and stared at the Buddha statue.

"...thinking about it, do either of you find that odd?" he asked.

"What?" asked Hinata quietly.

"The Buddha statue," said Shino. "A symbol of unattachment and non-violence in a fighting arena."

Akamaru tugged at Kiba's leg, and he picked him up as he spoke.

"That's not that weird," he said. "There're war Buddhas, anyway."

Shino frowned.

"How?" he asked. "That would seem counterintuitive."

"Th-they're representatives of fighting against the things that k-keep you from being enlightened," said Hinata.

Shino and Kiba both looked to her, curious.

"Everyone h-has to learn about it in m-my clan," said Hinata. "Me in particular, because they thought I'd be leading the rites someday."

She thought for a moment, then asked:

"I'm s-sorry, I kind of assumed you both believed in Buddhas as well..."

"That's okay," said Kiba. "I'm not really sure, to be honest. My family only prays to Buddhas or spirits when it's a festival or something really important's coming up."

Narrowing his eyes, Shino wondered what exactly his stance on religion was. Before his mother had died, he hadn't given the nature of Buddhas or spirits much thought. It wasn't that he actively denied their existence, it was more that they weren't that relevant to him. Now, though...did his mother still exist somewhere, even if she wasn't alive? Were his regular trips to the memorial to speak with her actually effective, or were they merely emotionally useful to him?

"I'm not sure either," he finally said. "But in any case, my clan is officially secular."

He looked back at the statue, then to Hinata.

"You said they were about fighting against what keeps you from enlightenment?"

Hinata nodded.

"I suppose that might make sense," said Shino. "If truth can emerge from the clash of adverse opinions, it might come out of the clash between adverse fists."

"I figured you'd know about all that stuff anyway," said Kiba.

Shino looked at him.

"Why?" he asked.

"You know about ghosts," said Kiba, "and human sacrifice and stuff."

"Knowing such things is pragmatism," said Shino. "There's plenty of folklore about Shinigami, but they're a real thing."

_Demon foxes too_, thought Hinata.

Then, as if on cue, Hinata heard a cry of anger somewhere outside. It was Naruto's voice.

Quickly performing the Byakugan, Hinata looked out to the front of the tower. There were two Narutos there: one knelt above the other and repeatedly punched him in the face, while the other, pinned to the ground, was frantically reaching for his kunai. A few metres away, Sasuke and Sakura looked on, both seeming quite surprised. Attempting to drag the attacking Naruto away, the attacking Naruto kicked the prone one and caused a puff of smoke, which revealed that the ninja lying on the ground was an imposter.

Hinata couldn't make out what the imposter-Naruto's headband symbol was, but he had spiked black hair and wore a breathing apparatus around his mouth. In any case, Sasuke and Naruto seemed to make short work of the intruder, both knocking him out quickly. With a final punch to Naruto that fell far short of the target, the intruder collapsed, apparently unconscious.

Naruto and Sasuke began arguing as they took a scroll off the intruder.

"You didn't even notice?!" Hinata heard Naruto shout, despite the distance between them.

Sasuke turned away from Naruto, holding two scrolls out to the guard-nin, and said something too quietly to be heard.

"Huh," said Naruto, rubbing his bandaged face.

Stepping forward to the guard-nin, Naruto suddenly jumped as Sasuke grabbed at his back. Throwing something into the air and pushing Naruto away, Sasuke shielded his eyes as a paper-bomb exploded in mid-air, showering Squad Seven with burnt-up paper.

"What?" Kiba asked Hinata, poking her on the arm. "What's happening?"

Hinata wondered how to explain all this.

"Um…" she said, pushing her fingers together.

A moment later, the doors slammed open as Squad Eight entered the room, Naruto and Sasuke still arguing.

"Pay better attention next time," said Sasuke.

"Yeah?" said Naruto. "How long did you _not_ notice I was gone?"

Looking more closely at Sasuke, he added:

"And what happened to your neck?!"

Assurances from Sakura calmed the two boys down, and the three of them went to the Konoha stands. To Hinata's regret, Naruto didn't say hello to her, though he didn't speak to anybody else either.

Over time, more squads came trickling in, and once Squad Ten entered the room, the guard-nin that accompanied them announced that time was up, and the next stage of the Chunin exams would be beginning shortly. Here, the senseis entered, each going to their squad.

"Good work on making it, guys," said Kurenai as she approached Squad Eight. "And Hinata."

"Thanks, sensei," said Kiba.

"Mm," Hinata nodded.

Thankful, Shino smiled at Kurenai, who seemed taken aback, then approving. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Ino glance at him, and rapidly had to order his kikai to stop moving. Forcing his smile to disappear, Shino looked disapprovingly as Yoru upbraided Hikui and Kohaku a little way away, while Reido calmly read a book.

"How in the hell does Yoru get past reasonable training standards, sensei?" asked Kiba.

Kurenai's expression soured as she watched Yoru.

"She's got connections," said Kurenai. "And her teams usually do produce good ninja. Or, at least, people who are good at being ninja."

Wondering what Kurenai meant by that, Hinata was distracted by the shrill noise of a whistle being blown. Everyone gathered at the railings and looked down as Anko stood in the centre of the room, holding her right hand up high to quieten everybody.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" Anko cried out, waving her hand in the air. "Arrrre you ready?!"

Much to Anko's visible disappointment, nobody in the stands responded with cheers, although Hinata thought Kakashi at least chuckled.

"Okay, you're all boring," said Anko. "Welcome to the preliminary finals of the Chunin Exams. You all made it this far, but the fights aren't over yet. Now you all go one-on-one."

There was muttering among the candidates, and Shino looked concerned.

"Sensei, how will that work?" he asked. "There are seven squads, which makes twenty-one people."

"I'm not sure," Kurenai responded. "There might be a three-person battle."

"They have those?" asked Kiba.

Kurenai nodded.

"They're not common in Chunin exams, but you never know..."

Anko pointed to a large electronic board that was hanging overhead, slightly to the left of the giant Buddha statue.

"Each fight is randomised based on this board," she said. "You have the option of forfeiting at any time, but the only way to go on is to fight."

Turning to another chunin, she said:

"Start it up."

With some flourish, the board lit up and began to spin numbers around. Each genin in the room stared on, tense, as their names all flashed past each other in a rapid spin of colours, until eventually it landed on two names:

_Ino Yamanaka vs Shino Aburame_.

Shino stared blankly at the numbers.

_This bodes ill for our nascent relationship_, he thought.

…_oh, who am I fooling? Any relationship I have with Ino is barely even foetal, let alone **nascent**._

"Good luck," said Kiba, lightly pushing Shino's shoulder to break the bug-nin out of his reverie.

"W-we'll cheer for you," said Hinata.

The look on Hinata's face suggested that she was not entirely certain this was the right thing to say.

"…thanks," Shino replied.

He walked past the other squads and down the stairs, Ino a little way ahead of him. At this point, he was unsure where the advantage lay. He had no idea of her prowess at taijutsu, though he knew he himself wasn't all that good, even after training so much with Kiba and Hinata. She'd been in his mind, too, but he hadn't felt like she'd been reading it. Most importantly, she didn't seem to have noticed the kikai when she'd possessed him. That meant that they were an ace up his sleeve if he she turned out to be stronger than him.

Thinking about it, though, Shino didn't particularly want Ino to know about the kikai. (He had an idea of why, but he wasn't quite willing to admit it to himself.)

Reaching the floor, both children stood in the centre of the room, the coughing ninja in between them.

Shino turned his head sideways (his sunglasses were polarized) to see Ino better, then spoke.

"Is your hair shorter?" he asked.

Ino looked surprised.

"Uh…yeah," she said.

Shino got the feeling that she wasn't expecting him to say that.

"Alright," said the coughing ninja. "Start when the timer goes to zero."

**3...** the board counted down.

**2...**

**1...**

**0.**

Ino brought her fingers together and with lightning speed cast her soul at Shino's body. He dodged to his right, hands up in a defensive taijutsu stance, and Ino's soul returned to her prone body. Flipping back up on her feet, she took a stance herself, turning sideways to face Shino and crouching slightly.

"Well?" she asked, expectantly.

Shino stared at her, blank.

"I was on the floor helpless," Ino said. "Why didn't you attack me?"

"That wouldn't be very sporting," he said.

Ino raised an eyebrow at this.

"Besides," he added, "My assumption is that you've only got the ability to use your jutsu a few times before you tire ou-"

She threw a shuriken at him.

This came almost too fast to dodge, and Shino leapt backwards in a manner he didn't think was all that graceful. Recovering, he parried Ino's hand-to-hand strikes and tried to strategise.

While Ino was not much of a taijutsu expert, neither was he; he relied on the element of surprise to have any success in hand-to-hand, and Ino had taken that from him. All she'd need to do to win would be to incapacitate him for a brief moment, then throw her soul into him and declare herself the winner. He had to go on the offensive.

Hoping it wouldn't terrify her, Shino leapt back as far as he could, and raised his hands up.

The kikai flowed from him, chittering as they flew through the air. Most of the crowd gasped, with everyone except Squad Eight on the Konoha side shocked.

"_Cool_," said Hikui, and ignored Yoru's disapproving sniffs to lean further over the railing.

Shino pointed at Ino, and the kikai flew towards her. Sweeping his left arm around, he used them to push her close to the wall. Mostly unaffected by her kicks and punches, the kikai formed ropes around Ino's hands, holding them apart at Shino's command. Thus incapacitated, Shino approached Ino.

"Do you admit defeat?" he asked.

Ino, breathing heavily, turned her head sharply to move her hair to her mouth. She then tugged on it, and a crumpled piece of paper fell from her side.

Far from the two of them, back on the Konoha side of the room, Naruto said:

"That's-"

As the paper fell, Ino kicked it at Shino with a glowing foot. As the paper lit up with chakra, Shino realised what it was, and quickly reformed the kikai to shield himself from the explosion of the paper bomb.

The explosion singed some kikai, leaving them to drop on the floor, and Shino felt a sudden numbness as Ino's soul entered his body. He watched her body behind him fall to the ground, and would have sighed with regret were he able to.

"Shino forfeits," she declared, in his voice.

The overseeing ninja's speech was interrupted by a brief coughing fit, but he eventually managed to proclaim:

"Ino wins."

There was a great deal of clapping on the Konoha stand, with cheers from Ino's squad and Asuma, and a nod of respect to Ino-Shino from Sakura. Sasuke, on the other hand, seemed to pay this development no great amount of attention. With disappointment on Shino's face, Ino exited Shino's body and went back to her own. Shino reabsorbed the kikai as quickly as he could, then saw Ino sitting on the floor. Hoping to be a good loser, Shino held out a hand to her.

"I'm fine," she said.

Shino nodded, and went to walk up the stairs to the Konoha stands.

Then, he sensed something.

Turning back, Shino went to the other side of the room, where the explosion happened. A thin outline of ash was there, as were ten or so burnt kikai. One was still moving, weakly buzzing as it flapped its one remaining wing.

Shino reached down with his hand, and called the last living kikai among them back to him. It responded, hopped onto his palm, and burrowed in, Shino wincing slightly as his skin broke and healed over.

This done, Shino left the dead kikai and went back up the stairs to the Konoha stand. Ino was surrounded by her squad, who were congratulating her.

"Good job, Ino," said Choji.

"Yeah, nice," said Shikamaru.

"No thanks to you two," said Ino. "I got us out of Kiba's rope-net, and all you two did was complain and eat chips!"

"I didn't eat chips," protested Shikamaru.

Back with Kiba and Hinata, Kurenai looked at Shino waiting behind Ino. Shino tried to ignore his sensei's gaze and spoke.

"How did you make the explosive tag drop?" he asked.

Ino stopped poking Shikamaru on the shoulder and turned around, surprised that Shino was there.

"My hair attached to it worked like a string," she said.

Shino nodded. That explained her shorter hair, in any case.

"It was an excellent strategy," he said.

"Thanks," she responded.

With this, the two children parted ways. Shino wondered why Kurenai had been looking at him. Did she know he know he liked – _was attracted to_ – Ino?

_I need to be less obvious_, Shino decided.

"Never mind, Shino," Kurenai said as he returned.

"It's alright," said Shino.

"Y-you did very well anyway," said Hinata.

"Yeah," said Kiba. "It was a good fight, man."

The board next to the Buddha started up again, and everyone turned around to look at it. After the words and pictures scrolled through, it eventually landed on two ninja:

_Kin Tsuchi vs Reido Zettai_.

Hinata looked over her shoulder as Reido put her book on the ground, walking away from her squad with nothing said between them. Yoru folded her arms confidently, smirking. Standing a metre away from Yoru, Hikui and Kohaku watched their teammate leave with mild interest.

On the floor, Reido faced a short girl with long dark hair who wore a scarf around her neck. At Hayate's cue, both bowed slightly, and once the countdown reached zero, the match began.

In a blur of movement, the dark-haired girl flung something at Reido. Reido stepped left to dodge it, then gasped with pain, clutching her left shoulder. Uncertain as to what was happening, Hinata activated the Byakugan, and found that Reido had a tiny needle stuck in her.

"What's going on?" whispered Kiba to Hinata.

"Sh-she threw a senbon," Hinata responded.

"What's the matter?" asked the dark-haired girl as Reido's breathing became more ragged. "Too much of a scholar to handle any pain?"

Reido began to speak, but instead fell to her knees and started coughing up blood.

Previously uninterested genin on both sides ran for the railings and watched as Reido doubled over in pain. Hinata turned off the Byakugan as she saw tears appear in Reido's eyes, and watched with shock as Kin kicked Reido in the stomach.

The coughing ninja stepped in and pushed Kin back.

"Get up!" shouted Yoru, running down the stairs. "Reido, get up!"

"She's unfit to fight now," said the coughing ninja, signalling for medics.

"NO!" screamed Yoru.

Against Yoru's protests, Reido was put on a stretcher and carried away. Looking despondent, Yoru returned to the Konoha stands amid much chatter from the genin.

Hinata watched Yoru as she spoke to her genin, sternly ordering them to follow her. Had Yoru just been exaggerating Reido's abilities, or was Reido holding back for some reason? From what Kurenai had said, genin under Yoru usually flourished.

Yoru turned sharply and walked out of a door to the side of the room, Kohaku and Hikui reluctantly following. Looking around cautiously, Hinata made sure nobody was looking at her, and created a Clone of herself. Stepping around the arguing Squad Ten, Hinata followed Yoru's squad at a distance, walking through a hallway. Eventually, they entered a room that branched off from the hallway. Hinata activated the Byakugan and entered a room just ahead of Yoru's squad's, leaning against the wall so as to hear them speaking.

Yoru spoke first.

"If the two of you disappoint me as much as Reido just did," she said, "there will be severe consequences."

"Sensei-" Hikui began.

"30 pushups, Hikui," said Yoru, not looking.

As Hikui dropped to the ground, Kohaku spoke.

"Reido couldn't've fought against poison," said Kohaku.

Yoru shook her head.

"She should have persevered," she said. "A field ninja needs to understand that. To leave a threat like her opponent alive is the height of incompetence."

"I'm glad...you're so concerned...about her test score," said Hikui, still doing pushups.

"Ninja are not trained to be failures," said Yoru. "I had assumed up until now that despite your deficiencies, Reido was worthy of my time. But it seems you and Kohaku have dragged her down."

There was silence.

"You know what, Yoru?" asked Kohaku. "If us three are really doing that badly right now, why don't we request an internal investigation of the squad? I'm sure the village'd be only too happy to look into your teaching methods."

Yoru smiled, which to Hinata seemed oddly disturbing. The jonin put her hand on Kohaku's shoulder.

"Maybe," she said. "But then I might have to divulge your...abnormality."

Hikui looked up nervously, frozen mid-pushup. Eyes wide, Kohaku pushed Yoru's hand off his shoulder and stepped away, standing beside Hikui.

"Please don't," he said, quietly.

"Then do better," said Yoru, still calm and smiling.

The door of the room swung open, and the coughing ninja stepped in. Hinata jumped, worried that he'd see her, before remembering she was on the other side of the wall. Yoru turned to face the interloper, her expression changing back to a haughty one. Behind her, Hikui stood up and held Kohaku's hand very tightly.

"Uh…"

The ninja paused to cough, then asked:

"…Kohaku Hosoi?"

Kohaku cautiously spoke.

"Yes?"

"You're up," said the ninja. "Against Naruto Uzumaki."

Hinata had to grab her mouth to avoid gasping, but none of Yoru's squad reacted as much. Letting go of Hikui's hand, Kohaku followed the coughing ninja, and Hikui and Yoru followed.

Waiting until they were outside the hallway entirely, Hinata carefully opened the door of her room, deactivating the Byakugan. Sighing at how little she could do to help Kohaku, she started to walk back to the main room.

She had an idea of what his 'abnormality' was.

A chunin suddenly stepped out from a door into the hallway. It was the same one that had passed Hinata before when she sat on the windowsill. As they passed each other, the chunin stopped and whispered to Hinata:

"Message from your father."

Hinata couldn't see through the chunin's disguise, but she guessed from his voice it was Orora.

"I-if it's from my father, I don't want it," she said.

"Humour me," said Orora.

Slowly, reluctantly, Hinata held out her hand, and Orora put a small piece of paper in it, torn from something else. Stuffing it in her pocket, Hinata turned and walked away, not bothering to see if Orora had left.

She returned, quietly dispelling the Clone she'd created. The board was counting down, and Naruto and Kohaku were facing one another.

**3...**

**2...**

**1...**

**0.**

Naruto was incredibly confused for the first thirty seconds of the fight, because it consisted of him frantically punching Kohaku to no effect whatsoever. Any time his fists reached the older boy, a flash of green light occurred, and they seemed to hit nothing but air.

"What the hell?" asked Naruto. "What's with you?"

Finally, Kohaku moved away from Naruto's strike and hit him in return. Naruto attempted to retaliate, but his attacks kept phasing through Kohaku as if they were nothing.

Growing tired of this, Naruto stepped back, still in a taijutsu stance but no longer attacking.

"How're you doing this?" he said.

Kohaku raised an eyebrow at him.

"What," he said, "you want me to explain my entire range of jutsu?"

Naruto considered this.

"…it'd help a lot," he said.

Shrugging, Kohaku stood still. Naruto, facing the Konoha stand and with his back to the other village's genin, stepped backwards until he had his back to a wall. Then, running as fast as he could, he ran up to Kohaku and, with all his might, failed to hit him again.

Kohaku calmly stepped right through Naruto as the orange-jacketed ninja tripped and fell to the ground. Amidst laughter on both sides, Naruto angrily pushed himself up from the floor, and faced Kohaku.

Now, their positions were reversed. Kohaku faced the Konoha side, and Naruto faced the side with ninja from Otogakure and Sunagakure. Briefly, Naruto glanced up at the genin there, but all regarded him with disdain or disinterest.

Naruto frowned. Even _outside_ of Konoha he was a nobody.

Recovering from his distraction, Naruto's eyes widened in worry as he saw Kohaku sink down into the floor. Bringing his hands together, he made as many shadow clones as he could.

The hundred or so Narutos began jumping around and doing flips, hoping to distract Kohaku from the real one among them. Somewhere, the Narutos thought they heard somebody giggle for a second, but they were probably just woozy from hitting the ground before.

As they moved around, the shadow clones began to disappear, a spectral green hand grabbing at their feet and knocking them off balance. Once each Naruto was gone, Kohaku rose from the ground among the smoke, and looked for his target.

The real Naruto was climbing up the Buddha statue, sneaking towards the head. Seeing this, Kohaku broke into a run, heading for the statue's base. Reaching it, Kohaku leapt up and ran up the statue's front, his feet glowing with chakra.

Kiba nudged Kurenai.

"Sensei, how's he doing that?"

"Ssh," she responded.

As Naruto reached the top, Kohaku jumped up and phased through the Buddha's head, hitting Naruto in the face. This Naruto disappeared.

The puff of smoke of its destruction gave way to six or so Narutos, who promptly grabbed Kohaku's feet and hands. Incapable of phasing with his hands kept apart, Kohaku was kicked a dozen times as he and the Narutos fell from the Buddha, landing in a pile of shadow clones.

The smoke clearing as the shadow clones dissipated, both boys pushed themselves upright, and took stances again, circling each other slowly.

"How can you make so many clones?" asked Kohaku, blood coming from his chin.

"...long story," said Naruto.

"Huh," said Kohaku. "Don't want to tell me?"

Naruto inclined his head a little.

"I don't even know your name," he said.

"It's on the giant board right behind you," said Kohaku.

There was silence.

"...I'm not lookin'," Naruto said.

"It's Kohaku," said Kohaku, wiping sweat from his forehead.

Naruto blinked, and prepared for the worst of it.

"Naruto Uzumaki," he said.

"I've heard of you," said Kohaku. "They say you're a loser."

After a moment's reflection, Naruto declared:

"…they're jealous 'cos they suck."

Kohaku laughed.

"Well, uh…" he said. "I kind of need to say something. Something I've been keeping quiet about for a long time."

"Yeah?"

Kohaku pointed behind him, to the Konoha stand.

"To them. Is that...okay?"

Naruto nodded.

"Hey," said Kohaku, louder than before. "Konoha stand!"

The ninja on Konoha stand all turned to pay attention to Kohaku. All seemed curious, save for Sasuke, disinterested as-usual.

"The match can't go on until I've said something," he said. "Naruto's cool with this."

He looked back to Naruto.

"Right?" he said.

Nodding again, Naruto stepped backwards, his fighting stance disappearing until he stood upright.

_I hope this guy's okay_, he thought_._

Kohaku wiped the blood from his chin.

"I've...been a ninja since I was six, like everybody else," he said, half to the Konoha stand and half to himself. "My parents are ninja and they've fought for their village, like pretty much everybody else in this room. And I passed the Academy at twelve, got my headband, and went into a squad, like all of you.

"But some ways, I'm not like all of you. My jutsu is weird. And…I'm not…I'm only…"

Blinking very quickly, Kohaku stuck his hands in his pockets and confessed it to the stand:

"…interested in other boys."

The room was so silent, Kohaku was worried everyone might hear his heart beating.

"I didn't think I'd tell everyone like this," he said. "But I had to."

He stared straight at Yoru, and added:

"Or Yoru Aotsuki would've said it for me."

The previous silence of the Konoha side was broken as every jonin and genin turned to stare at Yoru, who stoically didn't look at any of them.

"You held this over me for a year, sensei," said Kohaku. "I thought the person the village chose to make me into the best fucking ninja I could be wouldn't use it against me. But I can say it now. I've got Hikui."

He looked behind him to a very confused-looking Naruto.

"And Naruto here, who I've had my back turned to for well over a minute but still hasn't attacked me."

The orange boy shrugged.

"I can't fight you _now_," he said. "You're working stuff out."

Kohaku nodded.

"Thankyou," he said.

He looked around for Anko, and found her on the sidelines, rubbing her chin.

"Proctor Mitarashi," he said. "What channels do I go through to formally say all this against Yoru?"

Anko thought it over.

"…Hayate," she said, her usual energetic demeanour entirely absent, "can you take Kohaku, and Hikui to room 403? Get Reido too, if she's recovered."

The coughing ninja, whose name was Hayate, was apparently too surprised to even cough, as he simply said "Yeah" and went for the stairs. Hikui went to him, passing Yoru without acknowledging her.

Anko looked up at Yoru.

"Yoru," she said. "With me."

Yoru felt the stares of a roomful of highly trained killers, and as a result felt somewhat uncomfortable.

"He's lying," she said, loudly and shakily.

Realising that that obviously wasn't going to work, Yoru slowly walked down the stairs, with whatever dignity she might have had before disappearing in seconds. Reaching Anko, she stood in silence, now staring at the ceiling.

"Genma," Anko said, turning to a ninja with a straw of grass in his mouth. "You're proctor 'til we're back."

"Right," said Genma.

Anko turned and left through the door to the hallway, and Yoru walked behind her. The door shut behind Yoru with a click that echoed around the room.

This done, Hayate went to Kohaku, waiting a few metres away from the combatants.

Kohaku breathed what may have been a sigh of relief, and turned around to speak to Naruto.

"I have to go," Kohaku said.

Naruto frowned.

"What about the fight?" he said.

Kohaku smiled.

"Yeah, I'm sorry," he said. "I know you wanted to win a real match."

"Don't you?" asked Naruto.

Kohaku shook his head.

"Not like this," he said. "I don't wanna get promoted to chunin and think 'Yoru got me here', even for a second."

He looked to Genma.

"I forfeit," he said.

Kohaku joined Hikui, and began to walk away with Hayate. Just as Kohaku reached the door to the room, Naruto called out:

"I want a rematch, though!"

Kohaku thought on this.

"Deal," he said, and stepped out of the door.

00000

As they watched Naruto walk back up to the stairs, each member of Squad Eight thought about what they'd just witnessed.

"I was…not expecting that," Kiba said.

"An interesting development," noted Shino.

Hinata frowned.

"How is it 'interesting'?" she asked.

"Village law forbids discrimination by gender or sexuality," said Kurenai. "Yoru's gonna be grounded from missions for a long time, and she'll definitely never work with genin again."

"What'll happen to Squad Eleven?" asked Kiba.

"That's up to the Hokage," said Kurenai. "They'll most likely get a new sensei, but stay as a group."

As Naruto walked past Squad Eight, Kurenai called out to him.

"Naruto," Kurenai said.

He stopped.

"Yeah, Kurenai-sensei?"

"How you behaved out there was very chivalrous," she said.

"Huh?" asked Naruto.

"'Chivalrous' means acting like a gentleman, Naruto," said Kakashi.

"I'm not a gentleman!" Naruto protested. "Gentlemen wear kimonos and eat deer and stuff!"

"Technically, it also means you ride a horse," Shino added.

"And I've never done that either!" said Naruto. (He had always been scared of horses. He held a deep suspicion that they were somehow up to no good.)

"Just accept the compliment, Naruto," said Kakashi.

"Okay," he said. "Thanks, Kurenai-sensei."

Nodding to Shino, but not looking at Kiba or Hinata, Naruto went back to his squad, radiating joy when Kakashi informed him he was allowed to eat as much ramen as he wanted for the next three days.

Hinata ruefully pushed her fingers together. Had she been too forward, kissing him on the forehead before they entered the forest?

"You should talk to him," Kiba whispered to her, as everyone else was distracted by the board lighting up again.

"Y-_you_ should talk to him," said Hinata.

She then added:

"A-and that's not just a stupid comeback. You should."

Kiba shrugged, then leaned on the railing, rubbing Akamaru's chin.

_Pity I didn't get to fight him_, he thought as the board activated again. _Probably would'a worked a lot of stuff out that way. Still, Kohaku was lucky he got Naruto._

Looking sideways at Sasuke, Kiba had the feeling that not every genin here would have given Kohaku the chance to speak, given the huge opening in his defence it left. Sasuke was definitely the 'win at all costs' type, and Kiba really didn't like the look of that ginger kid with no eyebrows…

The board stopped.

_Kiba Inuzuka vs Sasuke Uchiha_.

"Woohoo!" shouted Ino, much to her squadmates' annoyance. "Go Sasuke!"

Kiba gave a sympathetic look to Shino, who shrugged at this, and fistbumped with Hinata before leaving for the stairs. Sasuke was already down on the floor, deep in strategic thought.

"Alright, Akamaru," Kiba whispered, "let's teach this pretty bastard why you shouldn't go up against an Inuzuka."

Barking in approval, Akamaru jumped down from Kiba's shoulder and walked by his side, boy and dog reaching Hayate quickly.

"This should be interesting, huh Sasuke?" asked Kiba, stretching. "You've never lost a taijutsu match, have you?"

To Kiba's surprise and delight, Sasuke deigned to respond.

"Have you ever been in one outside of training?" he asked, quietly.

"Tch," said Kiba, brimming with confidence. "I've seen stuff you wouldn't believe."

"Hn," said Sasuke, and he entered a fighting stance.

The board began to count down.

**3...**

**2...**

**1...**

**0.**

When Sasuke's fist slammed into his gut within the first second of the match, Kiba wondered if he hadn't overestimated his skills. Leaping backwards and then rolling away to avoid Sasuke's kick, Kiba barely had enough breath to shout for Akamaru. The little dog attempted to clamp onto Sasuke's arm, but the rival ninja was simply too fast, and Akamaru leapt through the air with no success.

"Fang Over Fang!" shouted Kiba, instructing Akamaru.

Akamaru spun rapidly, driving into the small of Sasuke's back as Kiba did his best to push away Sasuke's blows. Sasuke turned around to punch Akamaru away, and in that moment Kiba leapt as far as he could to the other end of the room, Akamaru following.

Landing on both feet and a hand, Kiba breathed raggedly, and stood up to wipe sweat from his brow. He glanced at the clock on the board, discovering they'd been fighting for about thirty seconds.

_Damn_, thought Kiba. _He's even better_ _than before._

Far away, Sasuke was standing still, staring off into the distance. Sniffing the air, Kiba detected a higher concentration of pheromones than had previously been present in the room.

_Jerk_, thought Kiba as he heard Ino and Sakura sighing.

"C'mon, Akamaru," he said.

Breaking into a run, the two of them charged at Sasuke, Kiba's fist raised and Akamaru's teeth bared. Sasuke, who ran forward to meet them, remained stoic.

As they reached each other, Kiba shouted "Psych!" and leapt over Sasuke instead of punching him, leaving Akamaru to bite at the Uchiha as Kiba struck at Sasuke's back. Sasuke was too fast again, however, and hit both Kiba and Akamaru with a spinning kick, sending both to the floor.

"Do you admit def-" Sasuke began to ask, and was interrupted by having to dodge Kiba's punch.

Stepping to the side, he parried Kiba's strikes with minimal effort, then kicked the dog-nin away again, letting him land beside Akamaru.

Almost growling in anger, Kiba's rage brought him a plan, and he grinned.

"Hey, bud," said Kiba to Akamaru. "You can jump high, right?"

Akamaru barked his agreement.

"Great," said Kiba. "Lemme just make sure Sasuke stay-"

Rolling out of the way to avoid Sasuke stomping on him, Kiba pushed himself up from the ground and landed a kick to Sasuke's chest, staggering the rival ninja. This done, Kiba grabbed onto Sasuke's arms and pulled them back as hard as he could, kicking at his legs to stop Sasuke from throwing him.

"Now!" shouted Kiba.

Akamaru leapt almost to the top of the building's roof, and began to spin. Kiba and Sasuke's hair rustled as Akamaru's spinning grew faster and faster, falling towards both of them.

_Yes_, thought Kiba. _Finally._

He was going to be the genin who beat Sasuke Uchiha.

"Come on, boy," Kiba said, as Akamaru fell closer and closer to them.

He could hear the air whistling as Akamaru pushed through it, only a few metres above them now.

"Come on…"

A sudden pain in his nose shocked Kiba, and he let go of Sasuke, realising that he'd been backwards-headbutted. Sasuke pushed him back and moved forward, and Akamaru fell between them, tearing up floorboards until he lay dazed in a crumpled heap.

The crowd on the Konoha side gasped.

"Wh…" Kiba began.

Sasuke turned around to reveal he was covered in ink-black blotches across his body, eyes glowing red.

Kiba laughed.

"The famous Sharingan?" he asked, stepping forward. "Can't the Sharingan only copy taijutsu? Which, by the way, Fang Over Fang is not?"

Sasuke said nothing, but he wasn't wearing his usual look of bored disdain. Here, he looked angry.

"…Sasuke?" asked Kiba.

Sasuke raised his foot over Akamaru, still unable to move.

Kiba's eyes widened.

"What are you doing?"

Sasuke raised his foot higher, his red eyes still staring into Kiba's own.

"Seriously," said Kiba, "what are you doing? It's Akamaru, leave him, he barely even touched you, if you want me to forfeit you don't have to hurt Akamaru-"

"Only losers forfeit," said Sasuke, and he brought his foot down on Akamaru.

The dog and his owner both cried out in pain as Sasuke's foot connected, and there was a collective shout of disapproval in the Konoha stands.

"Sensei!" Naruto shouted, despite Kakashi being right next to him. "He can't do that, right?"

Kakashi blinked.

"…Akamaru is a combatant," he said. "It's legal."

Sasuke stepped off Akamaru, leaving the dog to whimper as he turned his back on Kiba, walking towards the Konoha stairs. Kiba knelt by Akamaru, feeling his pulse.

"It's alright, boy," he said. "Hold on, you can make it."

Akamaru's bark was feeble but encouraging.

"I'm sorry," said Kiba, but Akamaru leaned up and licked his nose, despite his laboured breathing.

Kiba laughed with relief, then looked up as Sasuke spoke from far off.

"Are you ready to forfeit now?"

"I can't hear you," said Kiba, "when you're on the other end of the room and you're not even looking at me, staring out into space like you're a godsdamn t-shirt model, you _**dumb shit**_."

Much to Kiba's surprise, he heard laughter on both sides of the stadium, and on the Konoha stand he was pretty sure it was Naruto.

Sasuke turned around.

"You don't know anything," he said, eyes still red.

"Your clan dying?" asked Kiba. "That's your lifelong ticket to do whatever the hell you want and who cares about anyone else, right?"

The glare that Sasuke gave Kiba was the most honest emotion the dog-nin had seen the Uchiha ever express.

"I've had enough of this conversation," said Sasuke, beginning to move forward.

"Suits me," muttered Kiba, who broke into a run.

Even before Sasuke's fist connected with his face and he fell to the ground, Kiba knew he was about to lose. Whatever Sasuke had done to give himself the black spots on his body, it had made him stronger; far too strong for Kiba to manage without Hinata, Shino and Akamaru. But as he collapsed, in the last few seconds of consciousness, Kiba was happy.

_I'm the genin who got through to Sasuke Uchiha_.

00000

When Kiba recovered, he was lying down, and his vision was blurred. From the feeling of sheets on his body, he guessed it was a medical bay of some kind. Before the bed was a blur in the vague shape of a person.

"How is he?" he asked.

"Akamaru's stable," said the shape, in Kurenai's voice. "They've called your mother so she can take a second look, but the medics think he'll be fine."

"Great," said Kiba, as his vision finally resolved enough to see Kurenai standing over his bed.

"You overdid it," said Kurenai.

Kiba pushed himself into a sitting position, and shrugged.

"Maybe," he said.

"No, Kiba, you really went too far this time," she said. "Do you know what that fight looked like to everyone else out there?"

"A guy who stepped on a dog," said Kiba, "against a guy who fought tooth and nail to beat him for doing that."

Kurenai sat on Kiba's bed, Kiba moving his feet to give her space.

"According to the rules of the exams, which you signed," she said, "Akamaru was a combatant, same as you. Begging Sasuke not to hurt him would be like begging an enemy not to hurt Hinata or Shino if they were in a similar position."

"And that's bad?" asked Kiba.

"Kiba…" began Kurenai.

"No, come on, sensei," said Kiba. "Every time I've ever ended up part of a hostage situation, somebody's come through and saved the day. Akamaru couldn't 'cos he'd just done Fang Over Fang, and even though he's smart for a dog he's still a dog, but Hinata or Shino or someone else could'a gotten out of what Sasuke did."

"You shouldn't have gotten that emotional," said Kurenai. "It's a weakness of all three of you."

Kiba folded his arms.

"If getting emotional is a weakness, I'm fine being weak," he said. "I don't want to know what I'd be if I never expressed myself. 'Sides, I'm betting Sasuke's not so full of himself now, huh?"

Kurenai frowned disapprovingly, and leaned closer to Kiba.

"Kiba, I know you don't like Sasuke," she whispered. "It probably doesn't help that he's basically the only boy girls in your class ever showed interest in, but you can't let that interfere with your work as a ninja."

"That's not it," said Kiba. (It was _slightly_ true, but Kiba wasn't about to let Kurenai know that.) "Sasuke needs to lose. Winning over and over means you never get used to failure, which means when it finally happens you can't handle it. Sasuke losing to me would be great, because I'm not that good a ninja, so it'd show him even he can trip up sometimes. Maybe he'd lose some of that Hokage Monument-sized chip on his shoulder. But even now, when I yelled at him after he stepped on Akamaru, I'm pretty sure I got through to him. Not even he can keep everything inside forever."

"It's not your job to get through to Sasuke," said Kurenai. "And I'd ask you not to talk about his clan again."

_Stubborn kid_, thought Kurenai as Kiba looked away, frowning.

Eventually, he muttered:

"Yes, Kurenai-sensei."

Kurenai got off the bed, and Kiba began to move the bedsheets to leave.

"No," said Kurenai. "Stay there for now."

"I want to see Hinata fight," Kiba said as she began to walk out.

"She hasn't been called yet," said Kurenai, stopping at the door. "I'll get you when it's time."

Kiba smiled and nodded.

"Thanks, sensei," he said.

Ten minutes or so after Kurenai left, a medic-nin came over to Kiba, who was experimentally moving around his knuckles and looking at the bones move underneath the skin.

"Ahem," said the medic-nin, and Kiba abruptly stopped.

"Yeah?" he said, looking up.

"We think you're fine," said the medic. "Only unusual thing is the tests showed your adrenaline activity was a bit higher than usual for someone your age."

Kiba's smile receded a little.

"That's fine," he said. "I'm an Inuzuka."

"…oh," said the medic. "Sorry, I should have remembered."

"Hmm," said Kiba, who swung his feet off the bed and began to put his shoes on.

"I heard from Hayate a kid who was fighting came out during a match," said the medic as he straightened out pillows nearby.

"Yeah," said Kiba.

"How come?" asked the medic.

"His sensei was Yoru Aotsuki," said Kiba. "He said she was blackmailing him with it. She would've told everyone if he didn't."

The medic sighed.

"I'd say that's low even for Aotsuki, but thinking about it, that sounds exactly like her," he said, writing something on his clipboard. "At least now that kind of thing gets punished."

"Eventually," said Kiba.

"Well, we can't know if you guys don't report it," said the medic.

_Sure_, thought Kiba as he tightened the straps on his sandals, _the solution is for all of us to trust you __**more**__._

"Yeah," said Kiba. "Thanks for patching me up…"

"Kabuto," said the medic.

Thanking Kabuto, Kiba left the infirmary. When Kiba returned to the fighting room, two ninja were locked in battle, one wielding some kind of humanoid wooden machine at the other.

"These're the Sound guys, right?" he asked as he stood next to Shino and Hinata again.

"The bandaged one is from Otogakure," said Shino, "but the one in black's from Suna. Is Akamaru alright?"

"Yeah, he's fine, but they're waiting for a second opinion," said Kiba. "Medic-nin aren't all trained to cure dogs."

Seeing Hinata and Shino relieved, he looked around. A lot of the sensei weren't there (he guessed they were somewhere else, discussing what happened with Kohaku), and neither was Choji.

"Where's Choji?" he asked.

"He lost," said Hinata. "D-didn't you see him in the infirmary?"

"Nope," said Kiba. "Who beat him?

"Temari," said Hinata.

"The blonde girl with pigtails?" asked Kiba, as the bandaged shinobi frantically kicked at the black one's machine.

"Hm," Shino nodded. "He lost quite quickly, too."

Leaning on the rails nearby, Shikamaru scratched his nose and spoke.

"If you're not ready for these fights, it's better to drop out before you get hurt," he said.

As Shikamaru said this, Hinata noticed Neji a few metres away, the only member of his squad not watching the match. He glanced at her, then looked down at the floor below.

Noticing Hinata's nervous look, Shikamaru added:

"Maybe we'll end up fighting, Hinata," he said.

"I c-could deal with that," said Hinata. "We know each other better than I know anyone else left here."

"I'd probably forfeit," said Shikamaru.

"W-what?" asked Hinata. "But you and Ino and Choji all got so far!"

"Yeah," said Ino, "but it took us so long to get scrolls after you took ours, Shikamaru's probably minutes away from collapsing."

"You're a drag, Yamanaka," said Shikamaru.

The black-clad ninja won, and after packing his machine away, he returned to the Otogakure-Sunagakure stands.

"Uh…" said Naruto, scratching the back of his head and looking in Kiba's direction, "sorry about what Sasuke hurting your dog, Kiba."

"You shouldn't be apologising for what he did," said Kiba.

He looked around, and realised Sasuke was missing too.

"Where is he?" Kiba asked.

"Kakashi-sensei's taking care of him," said Sakura.

"What was the cause of the black spots on him?" asked Shino.

After getting over her surprise at hearing Shino speak to her, Sakura responded, looking away:

"I don't think I should talk about it."

_That's fair enough_, thought Kiba.

"Weird stuff happens in that forest," he mused.

"I have no idea either," said Naruto. "Wherever he learned to do that, I wasn't around."

Leaning onto the railing in front of him, Naruto added:

"Then again, Sasuke learns a lotta stuff quickly."

Hinata tried to look Naruto in the eye sympathetically, but he seemed to be avoiding her gaze.

She brought her fingers together and pushed them out of habit, then quickly stuck her hands in her pockets to stop herself from doing that.

_It probably doesn't mean anything_, she thought. _Naruto can't think about me all the time_.

Cursing her selfishness, Hinata became more annoyed as she felt the note from her father in her pocket. She'd throw it out, but the others might see, and she somehow suspected that notes from outside the exams weren't allowed.

"I hope I g-go next," she said, as the board lit up.

"I wanna go, though," said Shikamaru. "Being this nervous makes it hard to nap."

Hinata laughed.

_Who's left…_ she pondered. _Shikamaru, Sakura, everyone from Neji's squad… I hope it's somebody from Konoha._

_No!_ she scolded herself. _Just because someone's not from Konoha doesn't mean they can't be nice._

She looked nervously across the room to the Oto-Suna stand.

_Although if they're nice, they're all hiding it very well_, she thought.

Out of the corner of her eye, Hinata saw somebody watching her, and moving her head slightly revealed that it was Neji. His focused glare was unsettling. Was he trying to scare her before her match? Exactly how much did he want to sabotage her?

Hinata turned her head further, and stared back at Neji.

The board stopped, and Kiba poked her arm immediately.

Looking back, Hinata's bravery of a few seconds ago evaporated.

_Neji Hyuga vs Hinata Hyuga_.

Straightening out her jacket, Hinata walked towards the stairs, feeling like she was floating.

_This isn't actually happening_, she thought. _Any second, Shino will grow to thirty feet tall, and the room will be full of spoons, and I'll wake up in bed at hom-_

…_at Kiba's house._

Frowning resentfully at her disappointing subconscious, Hinata further thought:

_If I'm dreaming, why can't I dream about a giant pile of kittens or something?_

Reaching Genma before Neji did, Hinata bowed a little to the chunin, who was chewing on a piece of grass. Neji followed, slowly, walking towards Hinata with a purposeful stride. Hinata decided to jump backwards as soon as the fight started, hoping not to give Neji an edge in the first few seconds. That had cost Kiba in his match with Sasuke.

Once he reached Genma, Neji stood still, and Genma waved a hand. The board's countdown began.

**3...**

**2...**

**1...**

**0.**

Hinata stepped backward to avoid an attack that never came.

Neji did not move.

"Um..." said Genma. "…go?"

Neji reached up to the back of his head, untied the knot there, then threw his headband down. The clink of metal echoed as it landed on the floor, and for the first time, Hinata saw the seal on his head. It had long been described to her as a tattoo, but in truth it looked more like a scar, its dark X-shape seared into Neji's flesh.

This could only mean one thing.

Neji was daring her to activate the seal.

_This must have been father's doing_, Hinata thought. _An opening to rejoin the clan._

Stepping forward, Hinata crouched down and picked up Neji's headband, then stood up and held it out to him.

His calm disdain giving way to anger, Neji slapped the headband out of Hinata's hand and pushed at her with his other hand. She dodged, stepping sideways, and struck once herself, actually hitting Neji in the chest. It wasn't much use, considering that without the Byakugan hitting a chakra channel was incredibly difficult, but it still connected.

Both surprised at Hinata's success, Neji and Hinata stepped back to activate the Byakugan, and then the circling began. The ultimate goal of Gentle Fist was to outmanoeuvre the opponent so as to hit the chakra point on their lower neck, stopping chakra flow to the rest of their body. Footwork was vital to the flow, and Hinata regretted the fact that she'd never quite practiced it enough.

Neji moved forward and aimed for Hinata's face, which Hinata parried as quickly as she could manage, striking at Neji's chest in return. She'd overextended herself, however, and as she pulled back to avoid Neji hitting her in the neck, his right hand connected with her right shoulder, leaving it to flop uselessly.

Hinata almost jumped back and started drumming the place where Neji had struck her with her other hand, a technique for getting chakra to move again that Tsume had told her about.

"You have no chance of beating me without using the seal," said Neji, still circling.

Hinata said nothing, tapping her shoulder.

"It was made for the advantage of people like you," said Neji. "The children of firstborn, the ones that by pure luck found power and riches. It is not your fate to remain apart from the clan. As much as you hate it, it is your home, and you will always return."

"Y-you don't know what my fate is," said Hinata.

Neji dashed forward to hit Hinata in the belly. Realising this at the last second, Hinata chakra-jumped over him, then after landing on his other side, jump-kicked him in the ribs. There was an appreciative cheer from the crowd as Hinata landed and pushed herself up, seeing Neji stumble backwards at her attack.

For the first time in the fight, Hinata smiled. That was a Whirling Leaf attack - Gentle Fist rarely, if ever used kicks – but since the only Hyuga present was Neji, nobody was going to criticise her for using it.

Standing up, Hinata took up a fighting stance again, and leapt forward at Neji. He turned back to let her go past him, then she rolled out of the way of his strike at her back, hitting him on the right shoulder at the end. Swiping at his feet with a kick, Hinata stepped backwards as Neji resorted to kicking in return, then both moved back to a safe distance again, the circling game resuming.

Hinata breathed heavily. Despite her strength at Whirling Leaf, Neji was a better taijutsu specialist, and he was clearly less tired than she was.

_What I'm winning with right now might tire me out too much to go on_, Hinata thought. _Less chakra-jumping_.

She realised she'd been out of it too long, however, for Neji was already running towards her, and when his fist connected with her stomach she was thrown back, feet skidding on the floor, tears forming as she came to a stop and fell to the ground.

"Use the seal," said Neji, standing over her.

Hinata shook her head.

"Y-you…deserve better," she said.

Neji's eyes thinned.

"Better?" he asked.

"W-we're both fighting as equals," she said, looking up from the floor. "I-if you give up now, then you give in to what they want. They want things to stay the same forever, a-and that's the worst thing that could ever happen. You have to let go of everything s-someday, s-so..."

Hinata got to her feet, growing more steady.

"I'm sorry I never helped you, or any other of the Branch House," she said. "It doesn't matter what happened to me. I s-shouldn't have let how scared I was stop me."

Breathing out heavily, she added:

"A-and you shouldn't have treated me like you did."

"You're a Main House member," said Neji.

"Yes," said Hinata. "But that's not all I am. And th-there was no use hurting me."

Neji's glare softened, but he still seemed unconvinced.

"One of us must walk off this field a loser," he said. "This is our fate."

"The best ninja are losers," said Hinata. "I've failed at almost everything I've ever tried, b-but I'm still going to keep going."

They stood there in silence for a moment.

"…then I will fight you," said Neji. "And not for them."

As he stepped back to retrieve his headband, Hinata wondered at his wording.

'_Them'?_

Feeling around inside her pocket, Hinata moved the piece of paper around so she could read the message on it without taking the note out. As Neji tied his headband, Hinata saw the words:

_I'm proud you left_.

There was nothing else written there.

Hinata looked confused.

_Of all the things, father wrote that?_

Shaken out of this by seeing Neji waiting in the centre of the room, Hinata walked over to him, and the two took fighting stances again.

Hinata smiled.

"Good luck, Neji-niisan," she said.

Neji stared at her.

"You'll need it," added Hinata, and in a burst of movement struck him on the chest.

Stepping back, Neji kicked at Hinata with his right leg, then was met with her hand, paralysing his right foot. Letting it fall, Neji dodged a strike from Hinata's left hand and punched her in the stomach again. Hinata was only saved from winding by turning to the left slightly, but she still fell to her knees in pain.

Hoping to end the match quickly, Neji raised a hand to strike Hinata on the neck. Adrenaline pumping, Hinata rapidly stood up, hitting Neji in five places: the right knee, the right of the solar plexus, left of the chest near the heart, and finally the left side of the head, all with her left hand as her right defended.

Neji collapsed behind her.

"D...d'you admit...d-defeat?" she asked, out of breath.

Neji raised his face from the floor in an attempt to remain dignified.

"For now," he said.

"...Hinata wins," said Genma.

The Konoha stands erupted with cheers like a very supportive volcano as medic-nin came down with a stretcher. Some began loading Neji onto it, while two others checked Hinata.

"I'm a-alright," said Hinata, who was stumbling a little. "I just need to sit down."

As Neji was loaded onto the stretcher, he spoke to Hinata.

"Hinata..." he said, "…this is a good start."

"Thankyou," said Hinata, bowing her head a little.

"But I still don't like you very much," said Neji.

Hinata smiled.

"Th-that's okay," she said. "I d-don't really like you, either."

Walking back, Hinata was almost knocked over as Kiba hugged her. Laughing as she pushed him off, she fistbumped Shino as he stood to the side, and the three of them walked back to the foot of the stairs.

"Kurenai's squad is really touchy-feely," said Sakura, watching over the side of the rail.

Naruto didn't seem to hear her.

_Huh?_ thought Sakura. _Naruto's always bugging me…_

"Naruto?" she asked.

When he looked back at her for a second, he seemed uncertain about something, but Sakura only saw his face briefly. Quickly he left her, going to the top of the stairs to see Hinata, Kiba and Shino.

"You guys are all amazing," he said.

Tentatively, Kiba held out his fist.

After a moment's thought, Naruto made his own fist and fistbumped with Kiba, then also did so with Shino.

When Hinata held her fist out, though, Naruto's own fist wavered, and he lowered it.

Hinata tried very, very hard to stop herself from crying.

"_You're_ the amazingest," he said.

Naruto went down one step, held his arms out, and hugged Hinata.

Hinata tried very, very hard to stop herself from crying.

Again.

00000

The Konoha stand stood in reverent silence as the dust settled from Rock Lee's match, the critically injured shinobi being carried away on a stretcher.

"_Damn_," said Kiba.

"My sentiments exactly," said Shino.

"Did you see what that guy's jutsu was like?" asked Kiba. "Unbreakable defence."

"Lee's speed was phenomenal, though," said Shino. "I'm not certain who I'd less want to fight."

Hinata looked up to Kurenai.

"W-will he be alright, Kurenai-sensei?" she asked.

Kurenai watched as the chunin below held hushed discussions, while the red-haired boy returned to the Oto-Suna side.

"I don't know," said Kurenai.

"Lee..." Neji said, the only genin in his squad out of the infirmary.

"Poor guy didn't seem to know when to stop," said Kiba.

"_**Doesn't**_," corrected Neji, quite forcefully. "A mere career-ending injury won't stop Lee."

A gloom fell over all the Konoha genin.

"Someone's gonna have to fight that guy," said Naruto.

He looked nervously at Hinata.

"I-if I get him, I'll probably forfeit," said Hinata.

"Yeah," said Naruto. "I might too."

"It won't be randomly selected next round," said Kakashi.

Kiba looked over to Kakashi.

"What do you mean, Kakashi-sensei?" he asked.

"The Chunin exams bring a lot of money into the Land of Fire," said Asuma. "People will want to see certain ninja up against certain other ninja. With that much at stake, they won't want to leave things to chance."

"So who fights who, sensei?" asked Ino.

"It's down to whatever the village thinks is most interesting," said Asuma.

Shino put his hands together.

"...excellent," he said.

Kiba stared at him.

"How is this excellent?" he asked.

"Ino, Naruto, Sasuke and Hinata, you're all obviously capable ninja-"

"Gee, thanks," said Shikamaru, raising his head from slumber.

Immediately after winning his match, Shikamaru had declared 'nap time', and no amount of poking or nagging had roused him until this point.

"...I was under the impression you were asleep," said Shino.

"Just because I'm asleep doesn't mean I'm not paying attention," said Shikamaru, standing up.

"Fine," said Shino, "all of you and Shikamaru are capable ninja, but none of you are known outside of the village."

"Yeah I am!" Naruto protested. "I've got a bridge named after me!"

"You-...really?"

Kakashi and Sakura both nodded, Sasuke refusing to dignify this with any response.

"...that is impressive, and somewhat baffling," said Shino, "but the fact remains that Sasuke had the highest grades of any ninja in our year. Can such a ninja last long without developing a reputation? Of course not. Given that ninja from around the world will be coming for the final stage of the exams, and that Konoha wants to bring in as much money as possible, it's almost certain that Sasuke will be fighting Gaara."

"So we're okay?" asked Naruto.

"You're not going to be fighting Gaara," said Shino. "Who you will fight is beyond my ability to guess."

With the fights over, Anko returned, waving a hand again to call the winners over. The losing genin and their sensei began to leave, Neji nodding briefly to Hinata as he left with Tenten.

"That's gotta suck," said Kiba, after they left. "Not even getting one squad member into the finals."

"Th-that happened to Kohaku and Hikui as well," said Hinata.

Remembering, she added:

"Actually, Hikui d-didn't even get to fight."

"She won't, either," said Shino. "The number of finalists would be uneven."

"I guess that's how it goes," said Kiba. "This can't be the first time something's gone weird with exams."

He clapped a hand on Shino's shoulder.

"C'mon, Shino," he said, seeing other genin leave. "These guys probably all have to be in victory parades."

"Take your hand off my shoulder," said Shino.

"Yyyyep," said Kiba, doing so, and together they walked off.

"Congratulations, Hinata," said Kurenai. "I'll be waiting outside the room."

"O-okay," said Hinata.

_I wish Kurenai-sensei and Anko had been there when I won_, thought Hinata.

She'd been surprised at her victory, and it would have been nice for Anko and Kurenai to witness personally how all their training and encouragement wasn't lost on her.

_That's alright, though_, Hinata thought. _I proved I can win. And that's a good start._

Sakura was waiting in front of Sasuke and Naruto.

"Good luck," she said, holding hands behind her back.

"Thanks, Sakura," said Naruto, leaving for the stairs.

Sasuke said nothing, and followed after him. Watching him go, Sakura walked off to join Kakashi, not looking at Ino or Hinata.

"...Sakura!" Ino called out.

Sakura stopped walking and looked back at Ino, pink hair swishing as she turned.

"Make sure you two win," she said. "You're representing Konoha's kunoichi now."

"What if they make us fight each other?" asked Ino.

"No excuses!" said Sakura, and left for Kakashi again.

Now the only two remaining on the Konoha stand, Ino and Hinata went down the stairs and joined the others standing in line in the middle of the room. Sasuke and Naruto were on the other end of the line to Ino and Hinata. Between the two ends, Hinata counted six other genin: Kin, the girl who had fought Reido, a spiky-haired male genin from Kin's squad who'd fought Sakura, the still tired-looking Shikamaru, and all three members of the Sunagakure squad.

Anko walked up and down this line, as if she were inspecting her troops.

"So," she said. "You're all the finalists. You've fought long and hard to get here, and now you get to know who you're fighting. As of now, you'll get a month to get ready for the finals. This is not a guarantee that you'll make Chunin, but a lot of people watch these things. Important people. Make sure you look good out there when it's your shot."

Hayate handed Anko a stack of envelopes, and Anko handed them out one by one, each genin handling theirs nervously. As Hinata got hers, she began to open it with a finger, too concerned about damaging the contents to use a kunai.

Ino was first to discover her opponent.

"_Ino Yamanaka vs Kin Tsuchi_," she read out loud. "Oh, her."

"Be careful," Hinata said, still getting hers open.

Watching the other genin, she guessed from the glance that Sasuke shot at Gaara that they were fighting one another. Relieved, she briefly looked at Naruto struggling to open his envelope, then went back to her own.

_Maybe we can train together..._ she mused.

She opened her envelope, taking out the small piece of card that had her and her opponent's name on it. It was the wrong side, so she flipped it over.

In that moment, she felt like her heart had stopped entirely.

_Hinata Hyuga vs Naruto Uzumaki._

00000

I would like to reiterate that I'm terribly sorry that I've become the George R.R. Martin of _Naruto_ fanfiction. (In terms of update schedules, anyway. I'm not going to feature gratuituous nudity or thirty page-long feast scenes, and too many grim Northern accents would strain me.)


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